


The Book Of Dares

by Devilinureye



Category: Justice League Dark: Apokolips War (2020), Justice League vs. Teen Titans (2016), Teen Titans - All Media Types, Teen Titans: The Judas Contract (2017)
Genre: Christmas Fluff, DCAMU, DamiRae - Freeform, Demonbirds - Freeform, F/M, I don't know what I'm doing, Teen Titans - Freeform, inspired in dash and lily, just cute christmas cliche, no lemon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-21
Updated: 2020-12-21
Packaged: 2021-03-10 21:21:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 71,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28043838
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Devilinureye/pseuds/Devilinureye
Summary: Damian just wanted Christmas to be over and the forced joy to go away. Raven just wanted to be a normal 17 year old girl enjoying her favorite time of year.On that holiday, would they dare to venture out and meet their demons, fears, oppressions and fall in love?(Based on Netflix's Dash & Lily)
Relationships: Raven/Damian Wayne
Comments: 10
Kudos: 54





	1. Prologue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy holidays to you! It's not yet Christmas, but I decided to bring the prologue to you.
> 
> It's small, I know, but it's just a taste of what you'll be able to read soon, this week that begins. 
> 
> Stay safe, see you soon

_Imagine this:_

_You are in your favorite bookstore, scanning the shelves where your favorite books reside, and there… Nestled comfortably between the familiar spines, sits a red notebook._

_Now, Imagine you're in Gotham and it's Christmas._

_That you are surrounded by people, by possibilities... And with the hope that somewhere in the city is that one person that’s meant for you._

_You just have to find them._

_And how do you do that? It all depends on the kind of person you are._


	2. Damian

_**December 17th** _

Damian grunted despondently as he looked out over the crowded streets of Gotham. It was the most hateful time of the year for him. The forced and false joy of the people, the crowds gathering in stores to buy superfluous objects, the corals that drank so much eggnog that they even forgot the letters and of course the couples innocent enough to confuse the Christmas spirit with love.

He had already made that mistake before. Never again.

While he was thinking about his last Christmas holiday with his ex girlfriend, a body bumped hard enough into him, spreading silver plumes of Christmas necklaces all over his coat and making him curse in his mother tongue.

Why didn't people just look at where they were walking?

\- “Hey!” - He said angrily while the person, a girl in a dark blue cap and pink jacket, picked up her necklaces on the pavement without looking at him. - “Oh, come on, you dirtied my coat with glitter!”

\- “Sorry! Happy Holidays!” - She said smiling before running towards the choir that sang the same chorus for the 6th time since he was there in that part of the city.

Damian rolled his eyes while dusting off his jacket when his phone vibrated in his pants pocket and the message from Dick Grayson, his older foster brother, flashed on the screen. Every year Damian was obliged to participate in the Christmas celebrations with the Wayne family. However, after a year and a half since Alfred died, everyone seemed to have changed their perspective and they each found something else to do at that time of year.

And Damian did his best to get away from them all.

_“I'm in Bludhaven. Are you sure you will be fine with your friends? Me, Barbara and your niece Bryce will be more than happy to spend Christmas with you”_

He took a deep breath, looking at the phone screen as he thought about how to respond. They needed to create an emoji that represented the feeling of someone who was left by friends and siblings.

It would be successful in Gotham.

Damian just sent a yes with a heavy sigh. Each of his 5 siblings had insisted that he not be alone, especially since his father was in Hawaii with another new relationship, but Damian would rather die alone than having to endure his brothers' pitying look. The same look of pity when he said that he and Emiko were no longer a couple.

 _He had his own pride_.

Damian looked at the choir still singing that same song. The girl who had bumped into him with the glittery stuff had now joined them in the song and even from a distance, he could see her better now.  
Black hair like the night above them, blue eyes like the hat she wore on her head, skin pale as snow and big star-shaped earrings. She sang smiling with other people and looked no more than 17 years old.

For a brief moment her gaze fell on him, she smiled without stopping singing and Damian couldn’t control the muscles in his face from smiling back. He eventually turned and continued on his way while still listening to the singers' voice. Christmas echoed behind him and they finally finished the song they repeated so much.

 _At least she knew the lyrics_.

Damian walked in silence with his hands in his coat pockets on the deserted third avenue. There was a refuge to escape the Christmas hordes right at the meeting of Third Avenue and 20th Avenue. It was a few blocks away from all the hustle and bustle of Christmas that was concentrated on Summit Lane.

Some bookstores in Gotham, despite their high crime rate, found a way to earn a little more money at that time of year. They stayed open a little later for the unsuspecting patrons who hadn’t yet bought Christmas gifts so they could run around without fear of finding doors closed when they left their executive meetings at 21:00.

And one of one of these was the Gotham Bookshop, an old store from the time of Gothams past, founded in 1945, 10 years after the city itself was founded. It was an imposing building, restored to maintain its former glory. The place where Damian spent considerable time, hoping to find something he hadn't read in the irritatingly complete library at Wayne Manor.

Damian took a contented breath and walked between the shelves, sliding his fingertips over the spines of the books. Every now and then he found himself trying to get interested in the synopsis of some bestselling book among teenagers his age, but then he found something out of place.

A book by Gabriel Garcia Márquez, _One Hundred Years of Solitude_ from 1967, was thrown in the middle of the self-help book shelves with the letter M. He could let it go and just ignore things, but Damian was too methodical and stuff out of the place was something that brought the worst out of him. Was this book an important work that was stashed in a place where people rarely looked?  
Damian took the book and strode towards the information desk. He armed himself with his best artillery of arguments to explain to the attendant, who was looking at a huge list attentively, that the book was in not only the wrong letter, but also in the wrong section and that she should fix it.

\- "Hi. This was in the wrong place.”- He pointed to the cover of the book. -“It's _Gabriel Garcia Márquez_ , it should be at G from Garcia and not at M from Márquez.”- The attendant with blond hair like sunlight and cheeks full of freckles raised her bored eyes to Damian. - “Besides, this is romance and not self-help. So... ”- He held the book out to the girl, who for a few seconds just looked at the book stretched out to her without showing any reaction other than boredom, before taking the book in her hands and opening a smile that Damian knew was as fake as the plastic pine on the counter.

\- "Thanks." - Her smile closed instantly. - "If you ever work here I will remember that." - Damian opened his mouth to answer and then closed it again. She didn't seem to recognize who he really was and didn't care enough to find out too.

He took a deep breath and just decided to let it go. He was already having a bad day and he didn't need another reason for it to be worse, so he just put his hands in his coat pockets again and started walking between the shelves.

He was already in the letters O and S, his fingers running slowly over the spines to feel some kind of call, when something caught his eye. Among the yellow covers and primary colors, something stood out in the middle of everything. It was red and appeared to be made of some fake leather and had nothing written on the spine. Not even a faded title.

Damian dropped his head, curious as to what it should be as his fingers pulled the strange book off the shelf. When his eyes fell on the cover, Damian clicked his tongue in annoyance. It was not even a book like he thought, but a small red notebook, the kind used for small notes. Someone had probably forgotten that notebook on a table in the bookstore and someone else thought it would be fun to put it in the middle of the books.

He clapped it on his hands as he returned to the information desk again to ask if they needed help with the alphabetical order of the books.

\- “Look, this was also in the wrong section. This is not even a book!” The girl at the information desk just rolled her eyes and pretended to be on the phone, turning her back on Damian.

Damian gaped at her and then decided that he would organize it himself, with or without help from the counter attendant. He just needed to leave the notebook anywhere in the bookstore and then he would start his work, it was not possible that he would find errors on every shelf!  
He was ready to drop the red cover notebook in a trash bin when something else caught his eye, something he hadn't noticed before, and that now seemed to shine in his eyes.

On the cover, a black penned message was written, _“Do you dare...?_ ”

Damian felt curiosity itching under his skin, was that notebook testing his courage? He licked his bottom lip and then opened the notebook to the marked page.

 _“I left some clues for you,_ ” - it was written on the top, in a very perfect penmanship. - _“If you want them, turn the page. If not, put the notebook back on the shelf.”_ \- Damian raised his eyebrows and looked around, hoping to find whoever owned that notebook, but all he found were older people browsing the Gotham Gazette bestseller list.

He cocked an eyebrow and thought about what he should do. A part of him, the more rational one, told him to leave that notebook somewhere and stop hanging onto something from someone else. The person who owns that notebook could be writing something important that he was reading without permission.

But the other part of him, the biggest and most irrational side, was stoked, feeling challenged by the title and too curious to drop the book anywhere. He wanted to know what those clues were and what a fun game it could become. Who would play such a game?

Damian walked to the shelves with the notebook in his hand, finally deciding to give in to irrationality and curiosity and turning the page.

 _"So you mean you chose to play?"_ He read on the next page, _“A revealing choice about you. We can start?"_ Damian instinctively nodded and a second later he wanted to slap himself, why did he nod? He snorted to himself and then turned to the next page. On the next page there were 8 short lines that would form a sentence that Damian would not have imagined what it could be. _“This is a coded message. You can decipher it with the right books. But only if you can find them. Your first clue requires heavy reading. Look for “French pianism”. Charles Timbrell is your guy. 88/7/2. 88/7/3.”_

\- "What is ' _French pianism’_?" - Damian whispered to himself as he took the phone out of his pocket, getting ready to look for what it meant in the browser, he noticed a message written a little lower, in fine print.

 _“Oh, and if you need to use your cell phone, you better not even play the game.“_ \- Damian looked at the notebook curiously and felt a chuckle threatening to leave. Amused at how the notebook guessed that he would do just that. He scanned the shelves and then decided to go back to the girl at the information desk, maybe she could give a clue as to what that would be or who that notebook belonged to.

\- "French pianism." - He said, resting his elbows on the counter holding the book in both hands.

\- "I won't tell you anything." - The girl murmured from behind the computer, not bothering to look up at Damian.

\- “But isn't this the information desk? Aren't you, I don't know, obliged to inform me? ” - The girl with blond hair continued to look at the computer, with the same bored expression as before, slowly clicking on the mouse. - “Look, if this is because of the book from before, I ... I apologize. I know you wouldn't put the book on the wrong shelf and I had no intention of trying to teach you how to do your job ”- The girl continued in silence, looking at the computer screen with an arched eyebrow and a weary look that wanted to get Damian out of her face. - "What did I do? Did I give you _The Secret_ for Christmas? Or you just enjoy watching my anguish? ” - The girl finally looked up at Damian and then tilted her head to the side, but didn't say a word. - "Can you at least tell me the section?"

\- "I can't" - She said simply, as if her hands were tied in the situation. - "I promised her that I wouldn't talk about it." - She pointed with her head. - "But, since you asked, I do have a little fun with the anguish of a rich man."

\- "Wait a minute." - Damian frowned, focusing on just one word in the whole sentence. Was that notebook and challenge made by a girl? A girl walking around, between classic book sections? - "You said _'her'_."

\- "No, I didn't say anything." - The girl fidgeted, looking back at the computer screen

\- "You said. _'Her'_. So she is a woman and is testing my knowledge of books.” - The girl was silent, pretending not to hear Damian who just smiled victoriously. Was it a challenge? He would do it with pleasure. - "Thanks for the help," - Damian said sarcastically.

\- "I didn't help you!" - The girl said as Damian walked smiling to the shelves. He would play this game with pleasure and to win, he always played to win. He had a giant ego and even greater pride.

\- “Very well, Clue Girl. If this is how you want to play, then let's do it.”- Damian said to himself, as if the notebook could hear. He could feel the excitement of the game in his veins and anxiety eating through his chest. He was good at unraveling mysteries and finding clues, all he needed to do was think.

He didn't expect to enter the bookshop and play a game that night, but here he was.

Damian greatly considered the placement of the words. Pianism came from the piano, right? He walked along the shelves of music books, emerald green eyes looking between titles for something that would lead to “French pianos” but there was nothing there.  
Until his eyes fell on a large book, heavy enough to knock someone out if it fell on the head of an unsuspecting person who bumped into the shelf too hard. It lay forgotten on the top shelf of the bookcase.

 _"Heavy reading"_ said on the right clue? Perhaps it was not just a figure of speech.

Damian balanced himself between the shelves and picked up the book, tossing it on the floor to get it off the shelves. The book fell heavily against the floor, raising grains of dust that spiraled in the low ambient light. Damian snorted and picked it up off the floor, reading “Frances Pianism - Charles Timbrell” in bold letters on the navy blue cover. He opened the red notebook again, reading the first clue. It was now clear that the numbers did not mean shelves so they should mean pages, chapters, or lines in that huge book.

 _"Easy"_ Damian thought as he flipped through the book to page 88, seventh line, second and third word. He took out a pen he was carrying in his pocket and wrote the words, trying to make sense of them. He was a good detective when he wanted to be, but with just one verb he was able to achieve nothing but to instigate his curiosity more.

Time to move on to the next clue.

_“We are going to make things difficult. Fat Hoochie Prom Queen.”_

\- “Haha! Obviously, young adult and pink.” - Damian told himself as he walked to the teen book section, sneaking around until he found the small book with a pink and worn cover. He followed the steps of the first tip, page, line, and word and when he reached the third word it still didn’t help him discover the message. - "What?"

_“Your next book is not a Christmas tale, but Santa Claus appears to distribute weapons. Assuming you read it, what bothered you about that scene?”_

\- "Fine." - Damian laughed to himself, that he knew perfectly well without her having to say the title. _“The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe”_ by C.S.Lewis was one of the first books he read in the mansion's library and he knew exactly where to find the exact words of the page and line that was in the clue. - “The good old man gives a little girl a dagger.”

_"If you said, Santa Claus gave a gun to a child, you can go ahead."_

\- "You're making it very easy..." - Damian murmured, laughing as he looked back at the penultimate tip. - “It didn't bother me to be honest, but it's something that Grayson complained about for days!”

_“Your next clue is on the most popular titles of sex and sexuality.”_

\- "What?"

Damian swallowed, looking at the shelf farthest in the bookstore. It's not that he had a certain block to it, but it wasn't the subject he most wanted to talk about in a guessing game...

Besides, it didn't make sense about sexuality and sex in the whole sentence that was forming.

He had two options: face it or quit the game. But Damian's ego was bigger than anything and quitting a game was definitely out of the question for him. He took slow steps to the shelf, looking around so as not to be caught off guard by anyone he knew, then took the book in his hands, opening it quickly to the page indicated. He was writing " _alone_ " in the space when a familiar voice almost made him jump a few inches off the ground.

\- "Damian?" - shit. _Xiomara Rojas'_ voice came from beside him. The voice of someone whom he definitely didn't want to meet with.

Xiomara, or _Crush_ for friends, was one of the small group of mutual friends he and his ex-girlfriend Emiko Queen had. They were a group of no more than 5 people at the time, but they disbanded when Damian and Emiko broke up a year ago. Everyone was generally friendly most of the time, but Crush seemed to have some kind of hate for Damian.

\- "Crush." - Damian said, his tone of dismay delivering his real emotion at that moment. - "Hi."

\- "I didn't know you were in town." - She said, walking slowly towards him. - “There is no one here at the moment. Everyone went to France to exchange gifts and that's why I'm here. I'm looking for a gift for my girlfriend, Djinn remember? She loves fantasy.” - Damian nodded, pretending to pay attention to everything she said when he didn't even hear half of it.

\- "I remember that at her party last year, she challenged me to a duel about Harry Potter."

\- "Ah." - She made a face wrinkling her nose. - "As for this year, sorry for not inviting you. I just thought it would be weird, you know? But, since you're in town, show up. It's on Christmas Eve.” - Damian raised an eyebrow and thought up a quick solution of what to answer so he didn’t need to go to a party of people that he honestly hadn't had contact with for a year. They were friends of Emiko, not of him.

\- "Thanks, but I'm going to Hawaii with my father."

\- "Hawaii?"

\- "Yeah. They say it is quite comfortable during this time of year. 77 ° F or so and very beautiful beaches.” - He said hoping that the geographical knowledge he had would help to disguise the terrible liar he was.

\- "Got it." - Crush gave a fake smile, seeming to pretend to believe whatever Damian was making up. - “Too bad. Emiko is going. ” - Damian froze. He was no longer hopelessly and madly in love with Emiko, but he felt that something was still missing since they broke up. It was like he missed something, but he didn't know what it was.

\- "She returned?"

\- "Yes, just for Christmas." - Crush grinned, seeing that she had hit Damian right where she wanted to hit.

The deathly silence grew between them and Damian felt tremendously uncomfortable. He wanted her to leave so he could go back to his fun joke from before, or at least to any other shit that wasn't going to relive a past that he had left behind 365 days before.

Forgetting the book in his hand and the title it had (" _The art of gay sex_ ", really, why did this mysterious girl in the notebook think about it?). Damian hugged the book, looking everywhere except for Crush. Her eyes fell on the title of the book in his hands, her face turning a mixture of confusion and doubts, it was almost priceless.

\- "Uh... Do you want me to say something to her?" - Crush said, looking at the book and then at Damian and then to the book again.

Oh...

\- "Mmm... Just... I'm trying new things." - _Damn, it didn't come out as smart as he thought._

\- “Oh” - She raised her eyebrows. - “Okay. Mmm ... See you around then, Damian. ” - She murmured, turning her back, with the same look of shock and confusion stamped on her pale face.

\- "Wait, Crush." - Damian called, thinking of explaining himself but he knew it would only make things worse. - "For your girlfriend." - He held out the copy of _The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe_ for her. - “I think she'll like it, if she hasn't read it yet. It's a fantasy... With guns.” She made a face and then smiled, still looking confused.

\- "Oh thank you. Merry Christmas." - And without saying anything else, he turned towards the rest of the bookstore, leaving the book on some table.

Damian waited for her to be out of sight and looked for the red notebook again. In a hurry, he had thrust it in the middle of the bookshelf on sex and sexuality, and he was praying mentally not to have damaged the book in the process. He didn't want to have to explain why he had to go home with this book just because he had to pay for ruining it.

He opened the notebook quickly, praying he wouldn't be surprised any more by finding another message, when would this game end?

 _“The fact that you have no shame and browse a book about gay sex in public is very promising. However, some rules: if you are not a teenage guy, please return the notebook to the shelf. If the manual in your hands is relevant to you, you have my full support. Love is a spectrum. But, if girls are not on your spectrum, return the notebook to the shelf. Finally, if you've made it this far, it's obvious that you're smart. But I want to know...”_ Damian turned the page of the notebook and a separate sheet fell to his feet. He looked for a few seconds before deciding to pick up and open the sheet of paper.

_"...Do you dare?"_

Damian read the instructions 3 times, bitterly regretting having thought before that she was making things too easy. The instructions there were for public humiliation and he was definitely not up for it.  
In his hands, to discover the last two words of that whole sentence, there were lyrics for _“River”_ by _Joni Mitchell_. Dick always listened to this song when he entered the 'post breakup' phase, and Damian, without any intention, had already completely memorized the lyrics. But the instructions said that he would have the answer, if he did a dramatized reading on the bookstore's microphone so that everyone there could see.

He wouldn't do that in his craziest moment, even if he was drugged. But there was that flea of challenge eating under his skin, and there were so many words in the lyrics that would fit that sentence, that his sense threatened to leave and let him do that bullshit.  
Damian read the paper again, _"Do you dare?"_ burning and marking it as a mockery that he could not bear. Leaving his common sense behind, Damian strode towards the microphone, cursing himself between his teeth as he climbed the small mounted stage.

\- "You are cruel." - He murmured to the paper, before tapping his fingers on the microphone to test whether it was on or not. - "Hi people." - He said, and the microphone hummed, the thin and irritating noise of the feedback reaching the hearing of each person inside the bookstore. - “Sorry for the inconvenience, but I was asked to share a dramatized reading. And I apologize to Joni Mitchell, anyway.” - Damian ran his fingers through his hair and took a deep breath, holding his notebook and paper in his hands, ordering them to stop shaking. That was stupid, had he lost his mind because of an idiotic challenge with a girl he didn't know? That would be in the papers early in the morning, he knew that. - _“It's coming for Christmas. They are cutting down trees. They are raising reindeer. And singing songs of joy and peace. Oh, I wish I had a river. I could keep skating. But it doesn't snow here, it's really green...”_

Maybe she thought it would chase him away, but he had listened to this song over a million times with Dick, and deep down he even liked that song, and if she chose it, she should like it too. Was she there at that moment? Was she there among those unknown and known people to see if he had the courage?

\- _“...Oh, I wish I had a river. I could keep skating. I am so hard to deal with. I am selfish and I am sad. Now I lost the best baby I ever had.”_ \- For a moment, a possibility crossed Damian's mind. If the mysterious girl was really someone he knew? Someone with whom he spent days and nights hugging, and who had now left this feeling of lacking in his chest.

What if the mysterious girl was none other than Emiko Queen?

The rational part of him almost shouted that he was clinging to something that he knew wasn’t true. That he was only considering Emiko for being someone he was used to having around, it was he who had decided to end the relationship, after all.

But his emotional part was on the other side, telling him that this could be the way Emiko managed to tell him that they still had things to work out together. And it was strange that he thought about it after 365 days when he didn't think about it once.

Before he continued the next verse of the song, the microphone was turned off preventing him from continuing. Beside the speaker, the blonde-haired and bored-looking girl held the cable in her hands.  
It was the first time that Damian had actually observed "Tara" on the badge hanging around her neck.

\- “Hey! What are you doing? The song is not over yet.”

\- "I'm ending your suffering." - She said, wrapping the cable around her arm and then walking back to the information desk, before turning to Damian again, - "You already got what you needed. The last two words of the message. These are the first words you recited.”- And without giving Damian any further explanation, she turned her back again and walked to the counter, hiding behind the computer again.

Damian stood for a few seconds, looking in the direction the girl at the information desk went, and then shook his head and opened the notebook to write the last two words. The message finally appeared complete, but Damian still didn't have the answers he wanted.

_"Will you be alone for Christmas?"_

Damian raised an eyebrow. Why was someone strange asking him if he would spend Christmas alone? Worse, how did this person know that he would spend Christmas alone?

_"Here we are. Now it's up to you. Leave a message telling me how you feel at this time of year. If I like the answer, you may have news of myself. If you're not afraid, of course.”_

Damian smiled a smile he hadn't seen in a long time, but the curiosity to know who the girl was, was still eating away at his soul. He knew he needed to find out, needed to get to know her in some way and whatever reason. The adrenaline started shot through his blood and he ran to the information desk, willing himself not to leave until he had an answer.

\- "Who is she?"

\- "Do you think it would be that easy?" - The girl that Damian now knew was called Tara said, rolling her eyes. - “Even if I could, I wouldn't tell. If it’s not for you, then give it back to someone else to be able to play.” - Damian looked at the girl for a few seconds.

What was he thinking? He had dealt with Crush's taunts for as long as he dated Emiko, he could take a bookstore clerk not accepting him joining in that game without looking back. But he had done the whole game, he would not give the points to someone else to take all his hard work. He would know who this girl was, whether she was Emiko or not.

Damian smiled mischievously and just turned his back to the door, leaving the girl with blond hair and freckles, screaming for him to return the notebook. He wasn't scared, clue girl. He had been hooked for the challenge.

He needed to visit a friend who knew everything and everyone, and certainly could help him find out who this girl was.

_Maps Mizoguchi_

The bell at the rental door announced Damian's arrival, and a disappointed Maps came out from behind the counter.

\- "Dami! Are you going to Hawaii and you didn't tell me?” - Damian opened his mouth and closed it again.

\- "How do you...? Ah, Crush... ”- He rolled his eyes, sitting on the stool in front of the counter.  
Damian knew Maps from times before his relationship with Emiko. She and Damian met in high school at the age of 14, and Damian dragged her to his group of friends when he and Emiko started dating. When the group broke up, Damian and Maps still remained in touch, especially since Maps had a part-time job at a former movie rental company. Something she liked to call “old school in streaming times”.

\- "Yeah, she sent a message saying that you were weird even for your parameters."

\- "Did she just say that?" - Damian said, making a face. Knowing Xiomara, it was very strange that she had not mentioned what happened in the sexuality book session. Maps stepped out from behind the counter and walked over to Damian, placing her hand on his shoulder in a form of support.

\- "Look, know that I always support you, man." - Damian laughed, and then took her hand off his shoulder.

\- “I appreciate it, Mizoguchi, but I'm still the old me. And I'm not going to Hawaii.” - He huffed, - "I'm just trying to avoid meeting some people."

\- "What? Even me?" - Damian could almost see the pout of drama forming in the corner of Maps' lips. She was too sensitive for Damian's opinion, but he had learned to get used to it, it was Maps, after all.

\- "No, Maps... I need your films."

\- "Ah ..." - She smiled and went back to the counter again, - "So it's all good then."

\- "Anyway, what will the Mizoguchi family do for Christmas?"

\- “It will be awesome... Do you know Olive Silverlock? She came back with Kyle .. She came home and Colton came back too, you know, let's get the old gang together.”

\- "Maybe I'll show up." - Damian lied. - "But you need to let me know when you open your gift."

\- “What?” - She made a face. - “Why?”

\- "I helped your mother choose your gift."

\- "Oh no..." - She made the face of someone who was about to have a breakdown of curiosity. - "Come on, Dami... Give a hint."

\- "No, I won't tell you."

\- “What is Damian! Just a little hint!”

\- "Want to know? Do you know those robots that fight each other and that you said one day it would be cool to have?”

\- "No!"

\- "That 's not it."

\- "Moron!" - She hit him on the head with the DVD cover that was on the counter, while Damian laughed loudly. - "I’ll pay you back!"

Damian laughed to himself as Maps tried to hold back her laughter, and focus her attention on whatever she was doing before Damian arrived. The red notebook weighed in Damian's coat pocket as a reminder, and he took it out to reread and think about what he would write. He wanted to leave it at the bookstore and return the next day, but honestly, he couldn't think of how to better write his feelings about that time of the year.

\- "What is it?" - Maps said, looking at him with that curious look, as if Damian had a secret so exciting that she should know or she would die of curiosity. Damian looked up from the notebook quickly and looked back again, feeling the girl's words hook him more and more, pulling him into a game that could be dangerous. - "Don't tell me that Damian Wayne now writes in a journal."

\- "Ah... No, I found this in Gotham Bookshop." - Damian licked his lower lip, looking at the sheet written. The " _If you're not afraid"_ there, in bold letters. It was like poking him, making him feel restless and strange.

He could ask Maps, she worked at that movie rental store that seemed to have stayed since the 2000s. People signed when they picked up and returned a movie. But she surely would think he was crazy, and after what Crush had relayed to her, maybe it was better not to abuse it.

\- "I know this face, what do you want to ask Dami?"

\- "Oh, it's nothing Mizoguchi..." - He rolled his eyes. - "So... Do you recognize that handwriting, by any chance?" - Maps craned her neck a little and looked at the notebook for a long, excruciating second.

\- "Uhh... No, but I can say it's a girl's handwriting." - She furrowed her eyebrows, almost forming one. - "Yeah... It sure is a girl's handwriting."

\- “It's good, but it's not from Crush, is it? Not even Emiko…?”

\- "Man, I think they only write on their cell phones... Why?"

\- "It's nothing." - He murmured, looking back at the notebook. - “I'm just discarding some suspects. They left treasure hunt style clues. I was wondering who the girl was that wrote it... ”

\- "Awww... You already have a crush on a mysterious girl!"

\- "Mizoguchi, we are no longer 14 years old to “have a crush."

\- "But you do!"

\- "No! I don't even know who she is.”

\- “Which only makes it weirder that you are into her. I haven't seen you talk about a girl like that since... You know... her.”

\- "Maps, you can say her name, she is not Voldemort."

\- "Actually, it is better to call Voldemort by his name because it weakens him..."

\- "Okay, whatever." - Damian rolled his eyes, going to look at the shelf of French films that nobody would want to watch. - "I don't even know if I want to meet this girl, I just wanted to know who she is."

\- "Fine. Let's make a trap! This. If she is like you and visits bookshops at this time of year, then she also must like old fashioned movies. Tell her to come to Blockbuster to rent a Christmas movie, and when she signs up, boom! We have a name. I'm a genius!"

\- "Okay, I'll think about it." - Damian said, without looking at Maps, while taking a film off the shelf. - "I'll take this one."

\- “You always pick French films that nobody watches. What is it about?"

\- “A depressing French film about murder. Anyway... Thanks for the DVD, Maps.”- And before Maps questioned anything else, Damian took a booklet on the counter, and walked out to the cold Gotham street. He thought about going to the mansion, but it was a few blocks from his father's penthouse, and it was starting to get too cold to walk to the island where the mansion was. And to take a taxi at that hour in the garbage that was Gotham, was almost an impossible mission.

He was also in no mood to spend Christmas haunted by the ghosts of his past. Nor by the reminder that this year, Alfred Pennyworth would not make shortbread cookies for breakfast on December 25. Nor would he spread candy canes for each of Bruce Wayne's children.

He didn't need to remember all the losses he had in his life, all year long those losses were played against him.

Damian walked quietly to the imposing building above all of Gotham City. It was the largest building in the city, and part of it was dedicated to the Wayne Family's countless investments. The penthouse was a hiding place for his family, equipped for any emergency they needed. Damian planned to hide there for the duration of the parties, so he wouldn't have to meet any of his brothers, and explain why he wasn't in San Francisco with friends he didn't want to be with.

He took advantage of the solitude of the penthouse to put his head in place. This was the first Christmas he spent without the Wayne family mess, or the friends he had before his mother, Talia Al Ghul, had died in a plane crash 7 years ago. And as much as he didn't admit to it out loud, something about it made him feel weird.

In the period of 365 days, Damian had lost a lot and did not know how to process these losses. In fact, he was always a stone to know how to express and process any feeling, and ended up discounting everything in anger. That was shit. He had broken up on Christmas Eve the year before, because he didn't like the idea of distance dating, and had lost the father figure that Alfred Pennyworth meant for the whole family. His father had also married. And as much as he knew it was irrational for him to think about it at 17, Damian felt that soon, his father would have another child with his current wife, and he would be just one more on the list.

He still didn't handle it very well. He still didn't know how to deal with jealousy.

He put on comfortable pajamas, turned off the lights for a more intimate setting, and ordered a pizza. When he was bored enough, but still not sleepy, Damian began watching his boring French film that he had no desire to pay attention to.

His brothers thought he would spend Christmas with friends in San Francisco,

His friends thought he would spend Christmas with his father in Hawaii,

His father thought he would spend Christmas with his brother in Bludhaven,

A Christmas present for himself: _loneliness_.

Something he was used to living with.

Damian watched the scene on the huge TV, without actually paying attention to what the scene was really about. His head still weighed on the fact that he, at some point, thought that whoever had made the game of the notebook, was Emiko. They were friends and dated for a little over a year. But when she announced that she was going back to Japan with her mother, Damian decided it was best to break up.

There were 274 incredible days of exchanged caresses and kisses given under the moonlight. But that was followed by another 90 days that were no longer incredible, and another 90 days that the glow had passed and they preferred other things rather than to be together. He knew they weren't going to last and that it wouldn't be forever, but... it was too fast.

Damian just thought that it was easy to be with Emiko because she understood the darkness he had inside himself. It was automatic, like waking up and brushing your teeth. And so, when Emiko said she was leaving, Damian decided it was time to end the suffering.

He knew it wasn't love because love shouldn't make him think that way. He saw what love was in the eyes of his mother and father, in the eyes of Dick and Barbara, and even in the eyes of his father with Selina, and it was not what he saw with Emiko.

In a year, they went from lovebirds to a 40-year-old married couple.

It was comfortable to be with Emiko, and maybe for that reason, he was just thinking that she could come back into his life. Convenience, not love or any other affective feeling.

Not that he believed in this love bullshit anymore. It was as false to him as the Christmas spirit or Santa Claus.

Damian turned off the TV, too bored even for that movie, and looked at the notebook next to him. Eyes heavy on the question that seemed to weigh a ton on his back written on the cover. Who was this girl? What was she like? What are her favorite things, and where did she live?

He took a deep breath and opened the notebook onto a white page, determined to leave a message as the instruction had said. He wanted to play this game and get to know more of her, she seemed... thought-provoking, fun, and like him.

 _"You asked me how I feel this time of year."_ Damian wrote. _"I think we have a certain affinity, so you'll understand when I say it's the most hateful time of the year."_

_**December 18** _

Damian woke up with the sun rising the next day. The red notebook on his chest, reminding him that he had fallen asleep reading and rereading the whole game that girl had created. He needed to leave the book in exactly the same place where he found it, hoping she would come back to pick it up. So he needed to go back to Gotham Bookstore.

He wanted to know more, he wanted to meet that girl but he knew that spying in the bookstore wouldn't work. Especially if the girl at the information desk was there, so he followed almost the same plan that Maps had put together. He had just left an address where she would drop the book off next time.

He just hoped that Maps would collaborate with the plan.

He changed, had a quick coffee, and ran to the bookstore when she was opening her doors, and the employees were still looking sleepy. The girl at the information desk wasn't there yet, so she couldn't tear up his answer. He was sure she would do it the moment she looked at him again.  
He left the red notebook on exactly the same shelf where he had found it, between exactly the same books, and went out to the video store to tell Maps the whole plan. She needed to be attentive and that was the part that Damian cared most about.

Maps is easily distracted even with a butterfly.

\- "I knew it!" - She said excitedly, almost jumping behind the counter. - "Let’s call it a trap!"

\- “No... Don't call it that. That sounds like something strange.”

\- "But this is all strange and exciting!"

\- "Mizoguchi, pay attention, okay?"

\- "Yes."

\- "The tracks will instruct her to leave the notebook on one of the film shelves."

\- "Right."

\- "All you need to do is be attentive when she comes, understand?"

\- "So you can find out who she is without her knowing who you are?" - Maps raised an eyebrow accusingly, which made Damian feel a little, (almost nothing), bad. - "Isn't that kind of treacherous and ugly?"

\- "Fine, we can call it a trap." - Damian said in a defeated tone.

\- "Wonderful!"

But of course, asking Maps to pay attention to someone suspicious entering the movie store in ONE day, was asking too much. He left the only thing that could help him find out who this girl was, in the hands of a girl who was distracted by just about anything in high school, and who almost fell from the Tower of Gotham Academy in the very first year she studied there. He must have hoped it wouldn't work because at the end of the day, the only answer Damian got was that she hadn't been able to see who the girl was, because she was busy at the time.

\- "How come you didn't see her?"

\- "It was at a time that I was with some customers here!"

\- "What about security cameras?"

\- "What security cameras, Damian?"

\- "You said it would be a trap!"

\- "But this is also a video store, and by the way, my job."

\- “Shit.” - Damian rolled his eyes, holding the notebook in his hands.

\- "Ah... She left a message."

\- "You read it?"

\- "Of course I read it!" - She said, as if he were saying something absurd.

\- "Shit!" - He snorted, opening the notebook quickly on the marked page. There it was, a long message from her, from the girl he knew no more than just the letter and her taste for books.

_"It was worth trying. You tried to trick me.”_

\- “Maps, what does she mean? How does she know about the trap? ”

\- "And it gets worse... as hell."

\- "What?" - Maps pointed to the notebook, and then walked out to the middle of the shelves, hiding from Damian's gaze.

 _“I'm flattered, mysterious boy, but I'm not an easy prey. If you want to get to know me better, it will have to be through the notebook. And if you want my name, you will have to win it through a challenge.”_ \- Maps walked over to him and patted him on the shoulder, while Damian thought he was screwed.

He could just let this challenge thing go. It was just a stupid game from a girl he didn't know, but for some reason, she took away that desire to do something stupid. And Damian felt like he knew her, like he could hear her voice, instigating him, teasing him, challenging him with every question.

_It was worth the risk._

He decided that he would take the risk, he was already so deep in hell that he burned himself, and Maps was more than willing to help him. She had a different look in her eyes, Damian didn't know what it meant, but it made him worried. Maps was excited 100% of the time, when her eyes shone that way in particular, it was because she was about to do something crazy.

They met at Macy's door at 6:00 pm, when Maps managed to escape from work hours. Damian took a deep breath, watching the movement of people coming and going, with their bags full of gifts for their relatives and family. The sound of Christmas music from the suspended speakers making him want to cringe.

\- "Look..." - Maps said, looking at the Santa Claus decorative at the top of the entrance. - "Maybe this was a bad idea. You don't even know the girl. You both may end up being disappointed.”

\- “No, that's just it, Maps, I know her. When I read her words it's like I can hear her voice. She's sarcastic, sophisticated... and even kind of sadistic.”

\- "Sadistic?" - Maps raised her eyebrow.

\- “Look, is she sending me to a department store for Christmas? More sadistic? Impossible.” - Damian laughed. - "This girl wants me to suffer." - Damian said, looking at the line that formed in front of him, full of noisy children.

\- "Or maybe she just wants you to live the Christmas spirit."

\- "No..." - Damian had a malicious smile on his lips. - "I think I know her better than you, Maps."

\- "Can you at least be nice to Santa?"

\- "Sure."

_"Your mission, if you are brave enough, is to ask Santa Claus to tell you my name. If you have behaved this year, you need not worry. But if you want to escape security, you may need to do something bad."_

Damian looked up from his notebook just as a stick stopped him from moving forward. There, a little man dressed as Santa's elf, prevented him from getting close to the man in red with a white beard.

_Oh, was that what she was talking about? TT, easy._

\- “Only under 12 years old.” - The man looked bored.

\- “I think you can make an exception, right?”

\- “Sir, I said, just under 12 years old.”

\- “But I'm a Wayne, my father practically owns all this crap.”

\- “Santa Claus doesn't give a damn about who you are, sir.”

_What to say to a crazy and empowered elf?_

\- "The Gotham Gazette will be delighted to hear that Macy's stopped a Wayne from getting close to Santa, because of discrimination with teenagers."

\- "Teenagers cause problems."

\- "And I'm 11 years old." - Damian lied, with a smile on his face. The man looked at him in disbelief for a few seconds - "I'm tall for my age."

\- "Enough, I'll call security."

\- "Hey!" - Maps came running up beside Damian holding his arm. - "Do I know you?" She pointed to the elf as she pushed Damian aside. He understood the cue, she was distracting him.

\- "Only if you went to the North Pole."

\- "I swear I've seen you before!" - She gave an excited smile. - "I know, are you an actor? I work part time in a video store, I'm sure I've seen you in something."

\- "Uh." - The man changed his position, looking flat, and Damian could almost laugh, Maps was good at that.

\- "I knew it!" - Maps said, jumping up and down. - "You did Law & Order, didn't you? You were the murderer--"

\- "The corpse."

\- "Exactly! The murdered corpse!"

\- "You really watched it!" - The elf said, smiling with emotion.

\- "You know what?" - Maps said, holding the man by the shoulders, and pulling him to another corner. - "Your performance was memorable. One of the best I've seen! I really thought you were dead! Can you give me an autograph?" - She looked quickly at Damian, signaling him to go.

He smiled and walked discreetly toward the line, hoping that Maps would be able to distract the elf long enough, he felt the adrenaline rush in his blood. This girl was thought-provoking, and the game seemed to start getting fun, he wasn't going to give up now.

Damian ran when he was a considerable distance from the elf and Maps, leaning in front of a little girl who was going to the lap of the good old man.

\- "I'm sorry." - He pointed to the mother and daughter. - "It's an emergency"

\- "Ho-Ho-Ho, we have a big boy here." - The man dressed as Santa Claus said, looking at Damian. “But as I always say, there is no such thing as too old for Santa Claus.”

_"Show Santa the notebook and get your reward."_

\- "Look, I didn't come here for... this." - He pointed at Santa Claus himself while taking the notebook out of his pocket. - "I was sent by..." - Damian pointed at the notebook, looking quickly in the direction where Maps was still talking animatedly with the elf actor.

\- "Ah... Our mutual friend..."

\- "Yes! Well, I know you have something for me so could you please give it to me?"

\- "It's right here." - The man pointed at his head, where the red cap was.

\- "In your head?"

\- "in my hat"

\- "Oh, sure."

\- "Come, sit here on my lap first." - She could only be playing with him if she thought that he, at the height of his seventeen years, would sit on the lap of a stranger.

\- "I think it's not a good idea, and I'm in a hurry so, please give me the hat."

\- "Come on. If you want a gift from Santa Claus, you need to sit on his lap."

\- "That sentence has a pedophile connotation, did you know that or ...?"

\- "Can you hurry up?" - A woman said in line. - "There are really children waiting!"

\- "No Santa's lap, no gift."

Damian took a long breath, thinking of the possible ways to get that hat and run outside. He was about 3 steps away from the man, but he could easily be stopped by someone if they tried. He had only one chance and that involved sitting on that man's damn lap.

He hoped that no one was filming, or that anyone recognized him from the newspaper's gossip covers.

If he took the hat, he would have about 10 seconds until the weird elf chased him. Hopefully, he would run through the pine decorations as quickly as possible and arrive outside intact.

\- "Okay..." - Damian grunted, going up the two steps and sitting on the man's lap, listening to the giggles of three children in line. - "What? Do you want to see my Christmas list?"

The man smiled falsely under his fake white beard, and then he held Damian's shoulder and arm tightly. Damian would be able to easily disarm that hold on him, but it would attract attention and he didn't need it, he needed to stick to the plan to draw the least attention to himself.

He was just lucky that no one recognized him as a damned Wayne.

\- "I wanna give you a warning, punk." - The man said softly. - "Our mutual friend happens to be very special to me. She is a light in this damned and gray city, and I don't want her dating some snarky teenage smart-ass."

\- "Give me that hat!" - Damian hissed between his teeth.

\- "Promise me you won't hurt her!"

\- "You are hurting me!" - That was a lie.

\- "Promise me!"

\- "Why are you doing this, are you crazy? If you don't give me that hat, I'll tell all these kids that Santa Claus is smelling like bourbon."

\- "I have been sober for 6 years, you asshole!"

Damian looked quickly at where Maps was before, but he had already attracted a lot of attention, and now there were not only cell phone cameras in his direction, but also the elf with the bat in his hand.

\- "I need you to join me, Mr. Wayne, immediately." - Damian looked at the elf and nodded, projecting his plan into his mind. He would have very little time to architect everything, he would now have to dodge the elf, and instead of 10 seconds, he would have to do it in 5.

He got up slowly, as if to accompany the elf. Then he quickly pulled the cap off the head of the white-bearded man, and ran quickly towards the door, bumping into all the decorations in the store. He would have problems later, and probably his brothers would know that he was not in San Francisco, but stealing Santa's hat at Macy's, but it was too late to go back now.

The adrenaline rush in his blood made him laugh like a maniac, looking at people horrified that someone was stealing the good old man's hat so close to Christmas. And without him realizing it, something hit him, throwing him on the floor and making him grunt in pain.

\- "Do you think you are the first teenager to try to mess with Santa Claus?" - The elf said, huffing. - "That's why this year all the elves learned capoeira." - A bad-ass security arrived at that moment, and Damian hid the red hat under his coat, pretending to be holding where it hurt.

Was his pride hurt? yes. His body? not so much.

Both elf and security took him out of the store, and Damian had to control every ounce of his being to keep from hitting that annoying elf.

That little man was kicking him out of the store. Damian looked around for Maps, but in the confusion she seemed to have disappeared like smoke.

\- "You can kick me from the store without really kicking me, asshole!"

\- "You are banished from Santa's land forever!" - The elf said angrily.

\- "Actually, we don't have that authority." - Security said. - "But you, boy, should you be ashamed of yourself. A boy like you disturbing Santa Claus?"

\- "And you are on the list of bad boys."

\- "Hopefully the North Pole will melt with the climate change!" - The elf turned to go back, but he was pulled back by security from the store. Leaving Damian with a red notebook in his hand, and a Santa hat hidden in his coat pocket.

The red velvet hat with white plush tips, and a small plush ball on the end.

Damian looked at the instructions, seeming to sense her presence there. The leaves had a strange smell of vanilla and lavender. It made him feel like he could smell the unknown girl there, in front of him.

_"So, mysterious boy? Did you manage to meet your challenge? Now that you have Santa's hat on, can you feel the Christmas spirit? If you did, you'll find my name on the hat."_

Damian smiled, holding the hat in his hands, her name was supposed to be in there, or something to give him a clue about it, but when he stuck his hand in, there was nothing. Not even a lint of hair.

\- "What? No... No. No. No. What did I do wrong? I did everything you asked for, and I still don't know your--” - He turned the hat around trying to find something, until his fingers found something sewn almost hidden under the white fluffy part - “Oh.”

Written with a silver line, very small, he saw a name. A stupid smile appeared on his face without being able to control it, and his finger slid over the letters, seeming to want to memorize them.

\- "Raven..."

\- "You’re smiling!" - Maps said, coming from another store door. - "Oh my god, this is a Christmas miracle!"

\- "Look what Santa Claus gave me." - Damian said, showing the hat.

\- "You had fun, didn't you? I know you had fun."

\- "But if you tell someone, I’ll deny it."

\- "I also got a gift!" - She smiled, showing the picture of the elf from the autographed shop.

\- "An autographed portrait?"

\- "Yes! The elf is very cool. He is famous. He appeared in Law & Order: SVU."

\- "I have her name." - Damian said, unable to control the stupid smile on his face that refused to leave his lips. - "Her name is Raven."

\- "I like her name." - Maps said, smiling. She could see a different spark in Damian's eyes, a spark she had never seen before, not even when he dated Emiko.

\- "I liked it too..." - He let go of the air he had been holding in, licking his lower lip, while small flakes of snow began to spiral down from Gotham's dark sky. - "So... Can you do me a favor? I would but, I think I'll never be able to go in there again. Not until I can ask my father to do something."

\- "Mmn... Yes?"

\- "Okay..." - Damian smiled, and took a pen out of his pocket. Sitting on the curb to support the notebook on his knee, he left a message and a challenge for the mysterious girl he now knew as Raven, and when he finished, he handed the notebook over so that Maps could ask Santa Claus to give it to her, and then he would manage to get it back.

That night, Damian managed to sleep with a smile on his lips, while holding a red Santa hat in his hands.

_Her name is Raven._


	3. Raven

_**December 17th** _

Raven loved Christmas.

There was no other season in the year to make her more excited. The parties, the Christmas spirit, the colors, the lights and the smell of cookies in the oven, even the eggnog always improved her mood, and her family always celebrated together.

Raven didn’t remember a single Christmas she spent without the joy of the Kent and Roth brood around. She grew up in an environment where love was the greatest gift of all, and Christmas morning was where she could see all that love taking shape and color in front of her eyes.

Angela Roth, Raven's mother, was a single mother. When she was pregnant, Angela met Lois Lane and Clark Kent, and they soon connected like tethered souls in past lives. They became a big family, even though Lois and Clark lived in Metropolis, and Raven and Angela lived in Gotham.

Chosen families who crossed the bridge every December 24th and 25th to celebrate together.

Clark and Lois were godparents to Raven, and thought of her as a daughter from another household. Raven grew up in this environment, not knowing her biological father, but having a strong father figure in the large, but loving and clumsy Clark Kent.

There was magic at this time of year for Raven.

Christmas in Raven's misfit family meant love.

It was this time of year when her godparents met her mother, and it was when her fake brother, Conner, met his girlfriend Cassandra. They eventually broke up, but it still meant love, because it was on Christmas last year that he had met Tim, his new boyfriend.

Raven didn't have her own love story for Christmas. She had even tried. For a while, she fantasized about meeting the perfect guy at Gotham Bookstore, her favorite place in town.

She even stood next to her favorite bookshelf to see if anyone would have taste like hers, but she was socially awkward, and most kids only came into the bookshop for two things:

Schoolwork  
Or just to meetings with girls in the middle of hidden bookshelves

Raven's godmother, Lois Lane (whom Raven fondly called _Mrs. Basil E._ of Frankweiler's) said that it was because Raven had an old soul. Rose, her only friend, said she was too cool for her age.

Raven was sure they just wanted to be nice to her.

But for her, everything was fine, it may be that she didn't have a love story, but she had a family. And every Christmas, she had an apartment full of decorations, relatives, food trays and…

Raven opened the door of the small apartment that she shared with her mother, when she found three suitcases packed, and Angela walking from side to side looking for something that Raven didn't know what it was.

\- "Why are you packed?"

\- "Sorry my love." - She looked really sad - “It's just that since I had you, the opportunity to take a vacation trip of my own never came. And this year I decided, with some friends from work, to go to San Francisco.” - She put the bag on her shoulder. - "You can handle a Christmas without me, right?" - Raven opened her mouth, but closed it again trying to force herself to smile. She wasn't quite sure if the smile she showed looked real or if it looked like she was in pain.

But okay, she could give Angela this Christmas present, right? They would still be together in the new year, as was the tradition, and it's not like she was going to spend Christmas alone.

\- "Mmm... Of course mom." - She hugged Angela, who gave Raven a quick kiss on the forehead.

\- “Rose is coming here. She doesn't like spending Christmas with her father, you already know that, and I don't like the idea of leaving you alone in this city.”

\- “Wait, how can I be alone? Where are Uncle Clark and Aunt Lois? Conner and Jon?”

\- “They had to hurry to Smallville for an emergency with Ma Kent, Conner is going to spend Christmas with his boyfriend, and Rose has kindly agreed to spend Christmas with you here. Be understanding, my little bird, Lois and Clark said they will bring some corn for you.” - Angela smiled. - "The taxi has arrived, and so has Rose." - She looked out the window, and a few seconds later, Rose opened the door with her usual smile.

Rose was... _Rose_.

For a brief period of time, Angela and Rose's father had a relationship. Rose came as a gift on the weekends that she spent with Slade Wilson, and quickly became something like an "older sister". Even though Angela and Slade's relationship ended, Rose remained in contact with the entire Roth / Kent family.

But the thought of spending Christmas together with her and she alone, almost made Raven want to jump out of that window.

\- “I’m here Aunt Angela! Oh my god, you look so beautiful.”

\- "See you in the new year, my little bird." - Angela kissed Raven on the forehead again and left, pulling her bags outside, while giving instructions to Rose and Raven. They didn't even have time to react, just watched Angela get into the yellow taxi and leave, taking her Christmas spirit with her.

No, nothing would destroy Raven's Christmas spirit, and Rose's presence there could still mean family. Rose was lying on the small loveseat, legs up, as she checked the phone.

\- “How about we go to see the lights at Robinson Park tonight? It's mom’s tradition.”

\- "Mmm, I can’t..." - She raised her head from the sofa to look at Raven. - "I just got a date and he’s coming over now. So... Can you go somewhere?”

Raven took a deep breath and looked at Rose for a few long seconds, before forcing a smile again, and nodding. She couldn't say no, and honestly, anything was better than listening to Rose with her new relationship in the guest room.

She huffed out an annoyed breath, and just grabbed a coat and a hat, and left the apartment, trying to keep her head up and some of her pride intact. What had happened? Had she thrown a snowball at the Christmas spirits of the past, present and future? Why was everything going wrong? Why couldn't they respect traditions?

Raven walked around Gotham for a while. Watching couples on dates in cafes, or people buying gifts for their lovers, or teenagers her age meeting friends and laughing at teenage things. She didn't have a love story. And she had no problem with that. She didn't need one.

She had Christmas.

Looking at her reflection in the window, Raven felt an idea come to mind. She didn't have to spend it alone when Christmas was the perfect time to make friends. She took the phone out of her pocket and quickly posted an ad on her social media:

_Calling all Carolers._

And a few minutes later, Raven had the company of 4 other people for Christmas nights. It was clear that she would have to provide the eggnog, and they would not have time to rehearse. These people were older than her, but it was better than spending the nights regretting being alone.

Raven ran back to the apartment, needing to tell Rose the news. Maybe she would even be excited to participate. Rose didn't miss the opportunity to show herself to the world.

\- “Hey Rose, you won't believe it! I formed my own troupe of Carolers…! ”- Raven said, opening the door suddenly, and finding a mess of sheets. Rose and another boy, with blue eyes and dark black hair with a small white streak, were startled out from under that confusion. And almost with the speed of a flash, Raven understood what was happening, and a strangled cry came out of her mouth .

\- "Fuck!" - The boy said quickly.

\- "Raven for the love of God, get out of here!" - Rose said, putting the sheet around her quickly. Raven didn't question it, just closed the door and ran to her own room, trying to erase from her mind anything she had seen there.

Seriously, she was sure that she would have nightmares about it if she thought too much. The sex life of relatives and friends is something you should pretend to be unaware of, for the sake of your mental health.

She decided to focus on the repertoire that she would sing with her new group of Christmas singers, that would be good to help clear the mind. With a Christmas playlist on her headset and her notebook in her hands, Raven started putting together a setlist that would make her forget all that shit that was going on, when Rose appeared at the door, wearing sweatpants, a blanket and a sorry face.

\- "Can we try again?" - Raven looked up from the notebook and snorted, opening a wry smile and nodding yes. - "So... Did you do anything fun today?"

\- "I formed a caroling troupe."

\- "And who exactly is in this caroling troupe?"

\- “Some friends from the neighborhood. Donna, Roy, Wally, Kory, Victor... ”

\- "Raven..." - She made that face that Raven knew well what it meant, and entered Raven's room, throwing herself on the bed while looking at her. - "Hanging out with adults again? How many times do I need to say that you only need one friend older than you, and that friend is me?”

\- “The conversation flows much more with them. They read real books, they don't judge my clothes, they drink a lot... ”

\- "I’m sorry. This Christmas sucks."

\- "It doesn’t suck. It's fine. I'm fine."

\- “You are not Macy’s Santa. You don’t need to pretend to be happy.” - Raven took a deep breath and closed her eyes. She knew she didn't have to lie, it was just her defense mechanism.

\- "It's just that everyone has company for Christmas, except me." - Rose smiled thinly, and Raven knew what that meant too. She didn't need her pity, or her, or anyone. - "So... Who is he?"

\- “His name is Jay. He has a trendy bar in Neville. ”

\- "Oh my God, Neville is the new hot spot for Gotham bars and high society… And aww you love parties."

\- "And I think I really like him." - Raven opened her mouth, before thinking better of it, and closing it again. She was happy for Rose. She hadn't had many relationships that she actually said that, and the ones that she had ended up becoming isolated cases. - "We've been seeing each other for a few weeks and... He's cool, fun, hot, we have phenomenal sex."

\- "I don't need to know that"

\- "And... He makes me feel things."

Rose was a free spirit who had been hurt a lot. She had a sarcastic personality but, deep down, she sported a bruised and traumatized heart. She was a friend that Raven loved, despite being older than her and being quite the opposites.

Raven really hoped things would work out this time.

\- "I'm happy for you, Rose."

\- "You are incredible Rae, you will find someone incredible too."

\- “I am not like you. I'm not good at meeting guys, or talking to them. I'm just good at scaring them away.”

\- “Any tips? They don't leave me alone, it's tiring.”

\- "Here's a tip: delete Tinder."

\- "Haha..." - Rose made a face, and then her eyes fell on the red notebook in Raven's lap. - "Hey! I remember those little red notebooks, you always had a lot of them. Lois Lane always gave them to you. You even gave me a few.” - She said smiling, while she leafed through the notebook. - "Your mother always said that it would be good for me to _'vent my feelings'_. I must have written in it a couple of times. You saved it, why?

\- "If there's something I can't say out loud, I write it down here." - Raven raised her eyebrow, taking the notebook from Rose again and continued her writing. Rose stopped for a second, looking at nothing, and then looked at Raven.

\- "Raven!" - She stood up taking the notebook from Raven's hand and tearing the sheet she had just written. - "This is perfect."

\- "Hey!"

\- "Much better than Tinder." - She laughed, walking to look at Raven's book shelves. - "Here, give me the pen."

\- "Hey, what are we going to do?" - The boy that Raven now knew as Jay, appeared at the door, making the two girls look at him. He wore an open shirt over his chest and Raven could now see that his eyes were not really blue, but a shade of turquoise. He had a small J-shaped scar on his cheek, very curious in Raven's opinion, and was wearing an ear piercing.

\- "Finding her soulmate."

\- "Oh no..."

\- "Can I help you?"

\- “It's a treasure hunt. Take books to make clues.”

\- "What?" - Raven grunted, watching the two move around her room as they rummaged through the bookshelf she had.

\- “ _The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Fat Hoochie Prom Queen._ ”

\- " _The art of gay sex_?" - Jay wrinkled his nose, looking at the book in his hand. Rose looked at the book, at Jay, and then at Raven.

\- "Ah, it's mine." - Rose tapped her forehead. - “I was looking for it. Don't question me.”

\- "I will only allow it because I know it will not work." - Raven said, crossing her arms over her chest.

\- "How do you know that?" - Rose said, with a mischievous smile on her lips. - “I haven't told you the best part yet. You will hide it... at Gotham Bookstore.”

\- "Ah" - Raven made a face. - "No. Please don't make me do this.”

\- "Next to _Pride and Prejudice_." - Raven sighed and looked at the notebook in her hand and then at Rose. She could fight it, but she knew she would lose. When Rose put something in her head, nothing would get it out.

But Raven knew that if she left all of that in Rose's hand, something would be missing for her. She needed to have control over something at least once.

\- "OK. But the notebook is mine, let me choose something to include.”

\- "Okay... Did you think of a clue?"

\- "A song." - Raven said smiling, as she stretched out on the bed to get her headphones, and extended it to Rose and Jay. She was playing River, by Joni Mitchell. Rose winced as she listened.

\- "What a sad song!"

\- "I think it's perfect!" - Jay said, putting his arm on Rose's shoulder and she raised her eyebrow at him. It was then that Raven saw that Rose was in love, as much as she could deny it. Rose tried to fight it, but it melted quickly, like snow in the first rays of sunlight.  
Raven sighed, wanting to feel it in the depths of her heart.

\- "Mmm... Okay." Rose swallowed and shook her head. - “Let's write the clues and you can ask Tara to let you put the notebook there, and make her promise that she won't tell you anything. This way, you will find the other half of your soul, that is probably a version of you but with a penis.”

Raven snorted and just rolled her eyes, letting them do what they wanted to do, knowing in their hearts that it wouldn't work. It's not likely any kid in that city will go to Gotham Bookshop in the middle of the Christmas season to read Jane Austen, and play treasure hunt with someone unknown.

This only happened in silly Netflix cliches, and novels.

But she had no choice, and Rose wouldn't leave her alone if she didn't. So, before going to meet her group of Christmas singers, Raven stopped by the bookstore. She left the notebook carefully resting between two different editions of Pride and Prejudice, and the instructions with Tara on the counter.

Raven looked at her watch and panic filled her chest, because of Rose's idea, she was late and probably her group of singers had already started without her. Raven ran through the streets, dodging bodies in the crowd of people and their Christmas shopping, when she bumped into a boy, the necklaces of shiny ribbons spread across his expensive coat, but Raven didn't have time to stop.

\- "Hey!" - He said irritably, while cleaning the lapels of his coat. Raven didn't see him, she was busy bending down to pick up the necklaces that had fallen from her hand. - "Oh come on, you dirtied my coat with glitter!"

\- "Sorry!" - Raven shouted, smiling as she started running towards the choir - "Happy holidays!"

\- "Raven!" - A little lady shouted when she passed the Christmas ornament tent. Raven had known her since she was a little girl, she lived downstairs in the same building as Raven, although Raven never remembered her name. - “Raven! Thank god you’ve arrived.”

\- "Is it really bad?"

\- "Without you? Terrible." - Raven scowled and nodded, running to her new chorus of friends. They were singing the same verse for the fourth time and they looked drunk. Nice.

\- "Ah, Raven has arrived, we are saved!" - Wally said, taking the necklace that Raven held out for them.

\- "Sorry for the delay."

\- "We drank all the eggnog." - Donna said, with a smile that Raven could judge from a distance that she was drunk.

\- "I went to get these necklaces and I had to stop by the bookshop to leave something."

\- “Oh... Cool star earrings! I Like them."

\- "Okay ..." - Donna said, putting her hands in her pocket again. - "Come on, Joy to the World, third verse. We need you, Rae. Very much."

\- "I don't remember the lyrics." - Kory said, laughing. Raven returned the smile and continued on singing. Her eyes traveled all over the place, finding the boy she had brushed against before, still cleaning the lint from his coat.

He had dark hair and cinnamon skin. His green eyes lifted from his coat and landed on Raven's eyes, and she just managed to smile. He smiled back before turning and disappearing into the crowd of people with their purchased Christmas presents.

 _He was handsome_ , Raven thought, _too handsome._

_**December 18** _

The next day, she decided that being alone at home was not a good reason why there were no decorations and celebrations. So she woke up early and went out alone to find the perfect Christmas tree. She came back all the way carrying her pine, and almost broke some of her mother's things in the process.

She baked cookies, even though her cooking talent was just cooking instant noodles.  
Then she received a message.

_"You got a bite - Tara Markov."_

Raven opened her mouth in surprise, and then reality fell on her head with the weight of an anchor. Someone had taken her tips and really got into the game. There was someone willing to play Rose's stupid game in that gray city that was Gotham.

\- "Yay!" - Raven said, jumping up with her cell phone in hand before settling down and trying to control herself. - “Stay calm, Raven. Stay calm.“

She couldn't wait for Rose to wake up and didn't want to be chatting by messages. Tara was too monosyllabic in person, by message it was almost impossible to talk to her and have a message answered before a year.

Raven grabbed her coat and hurried off to the bookstore, finding Tara organizing the books on the shelves.

\- "He left the notebook earlier today."

\- “Was he cool? Was he cute? Are you sure he was a teenager? How would you describe him?”

\- "Snarly." - Tara said, while placing three books at once on the shelf.

\- "Snarly?" - Raven repeated, wrinkling her nose.

\- “Snarly, annoyingly pedantic. But he committed to the Joni part, though.”

\- "Did he leave a message?"

\- "He left instructions..." - Tara for the first time expressed a different emotion of contempt, showing the red notebook to Raven who tried to take it from her hands.

\- "Instructions?" - Tara raised an eyebrow and shrugged, leaving Raven alone to read the instructions in the notebook, while she put books back on shelves.

Raven felt anxious, she didn't really expect instructions. She hoped there was a message as she had put it at the end. With shaking hands, Raven opened the notebook to the part marked by the red ribbon. Finding a perfectly cursive handwriting and the smell of cinnamon and spices marked in the message, as she walked back home, hoping that Rose was awake to see that her plan had worked.

 _“Do I dare? Not for anyone. But apparently, Clue Girl, I dare for you. I admire your words, I applaud your musical taste, I don't know what I think of your propensity for public exposure, but I have to confess: you intrigue me.”_ \- Raven broke out into a smile that she couldn't control and hugged the notebook, trying not to let her heart beat faster than it was already beating. _Her_? Did she intrigue someone? This seemed like a Christmas dream that she had fantasized too much about. - _“You asked what I feel this time of year. It looks like we’re kindred spirits, so you'll understand when I say... ”_

All the joy and the silly smile on Raven's face was gone when she read the next sentence.

Raven ran home and opened the guest room door abruptly again, and again finding Rose and the guy in a way too awkward position.

\- "He hates Christmas!"

\- “Raven! Get out of my room!"

\- "Wait, do you have a suitor?" Jay lifted his head from under the sheet, looking at Raven with a raised eyebrow. - "What did he say?"

\- _“It is the most hateful time of the year. Forced joy, maddened crowds.”_

\- "Ouch..." - Rose made a face. - "He misunderstood you."

\- "Because of you!" - Raven pointed at Rose. - “You wrote the clues. It made me look jaded, and snarky, and cool. ”

\- "I think you're cool..." - Jay said, with a frown.

\- "Uh... Thanks Jay." - Raven huffed and put the notebook in the bag. - "He left his own clues. He wants me to follow them."

\- "Great! Then tell me how it goes, okay? Bye Raven, have fun.”

\- “I’m not doing it! We… We obviously have nothing in common.” - Rose sighed and sat up in the bed, holding the sheet up to her chest.

\- “Raven, I love you. I would never make you do anything.”

\- "But...?"

\- "But what? Return the notebook and try again.”

\- "I thought you were going to tell me to give him another chance."

\- "Love is not like that." - Rose made an annoyed face. - “You either feel it or you don't. Now... Close the door when you leave, please? ” - She gave a fake smile and Raven understood the cue, leaving the room and closing the door quickly.

Rose should either start to lock the room, or she should stop being so moved by the impulse.

Raven groaned and stared at the ceiling, the little book haunting her on the dresser in the bedroom. Why did she think it would work? Gotham was a city of embittered and sick people inside, she was different, and that was the reason why she had no friends.  
That was why that Christmas, she was spending her cold days and nights singing with the carolers amidst places full of people with cold hearts.

_The Carolers!_

Raven sat up abruptly on the bed, taking a map of Gotham from the drawer and running around the room while she looked for a red pen. That was what she would focus on, that notebook was a waste of time, and she could spend her time singing in as many places in the city that she could get to. Raven marked all the busy and nearby places where they could sing, with red dots on the map, parks, fairs, stores.

She would bring as much Christmas spirit to that gray city as she could.

Raven looked over the map marked with red dots and took a satisfied deep breath. And then looked up to find the notebook laying there again, and the boy's words echoing in her mind.

_"You intrigue me"_

No, she didn't need that. She shook her head and tossed the notebook into a drawer, ready to lock that idea away deep in her heart. She then left the house with the map in her hand. If Rose didn't leave the room, she wouldn't even notice that Raven wouldn’t be back until late that day, not that she was going to care anymore.

Raven, Kory, Wally, Victor, Donna and Roy started with a busy square, and after 3 other places, they were at Robinson Park. They stayed there until just before lunchtime, when the sun was beginning to push a little harder to appear over the gray clouds, and the streets started to get a little busier in the commercial areas with people going to lunch.

Raven knew she should write something for the boy, but that scared her, while singing happy Christmas songs was comfortable, safe, and cozy. She liked to stay in the comfort zone.

She looked away from a group of girls she noticed talking in the distance, those girls always made her feel weird. She knew them, they were all from her school. They all studied with Raven and had friends, and boyfriends, and did teen stuff.

Donna watched where Raven was looking, and then at Raven, trying to understand why the dark-haired girl had stopped singing, when she was the most excited of them all.

\- "Don't tell me you forgot the lyrics."

\- "Um... No..." - Raven shook her head, trying to stop looking at the group of girls smiling in the distance.

\- "Do you know those girls?"

\- "They belong to my group from my literature class." - Raven said, she then tensed. One of the girls, Meghan, looked at where Raven was. But when Raven gave a discreet nod, she looked in the other direction, while a group of boys came up to them and they all left, seeming not to see Raven at all.

They probably didn't even know who Raven was.

How did someone get a boyfriend at a girls' school?

Raven felt downhearted watching them walk away from her with their Christmas romances, and their laughter. She would never admit it, but she was jealous of these girls and their normal teenage lives.

\- “Well,” - She said, pulling out the map to show her caroling friends, - “I mapped all the places where we can go to sing next. The best parks and courtyards... ”

\- "It's too cold to continue." - Kory said, drinking some of the eggnog.

\- "Then we can go do something else!" - Raven suggested almost instantly. She didn't want to have to come home and deal with Rose and her sexual romance with Jay. - “There's a new Pixar film, _Collage_. It's about a stapler who falls in love with a paper”

\- "I have to work on some pictures tonight." - Donna said, crossing her arms as she walked away.

\- "And I have to finish my thesis." - Wally said.

\- "And I have a life." - Roy said. - "And a daughter." - And so, each of Raven's troupe friends started to leave, and follow Donna back into their lives. Raven didn't want to go back to her life, not when she wasn't ready to face the red notebook yet.

\- "We can go and have hot chocolate!" - Raven said, trying to get them to come back. - "Or go to a bar."

Donna looked at Raven standing there, feeling abandoned and alone. Raven was an unusual teenager for Donna. But she knew that the girl had a good heart, she just needed friendships that were like her, and of her own age.

\- “Look, Raven, “- Donna said, returning to Raven, - “I also didn't have many friends at your age, and adolescence sucks, no offense, but if you don't want to be alone, expand your bubble.”

\- "I don't have a bubble."

\- "Look at your map." - Donna smiled and walked away again, leaving Raven with thousands of doubts in her head, and alone in the middle of the park. Raven sighed in resignation, while listening to the sound of Donna's voice echoing in her mind, she looked at the map, that girl was somehow right.

The red dots on the map formed a bubble, and all of these points led to one place: Gotham's Bookstore.

All the dots led to the red notebook and the mysterious boy.

Raven came home reflecting on what she should do, this boy for some reason was waiting for her to answer back. He might have been like her, abandoned by other people his age and looking for a little friendship because he was seen as a foreigner in his own circle.

She could try to make a new friend, she could try again.

Raven didn't look for Rose this time, she was sure she would be in her room or somewhere in town eating something. She went straight to the dresser and took out the notebook, trying to calm her heart that was beating fast against her chest.

She took a breath, letting it out slowly, as she opened the boy's message again, almost hearing his voice as she read. There was a peculiar smell of cinnamon on the paper and Raven could almost imagine his essence there.

 _“You asked how I feel at this time of year. It looks like we're kindred spirits, so you'll understand when I say it's the most hateful time of the year. Forced joy, maddened crowds, having to show happiness you don't feel. Because loneliness at Christmas is even worse than the rest of the year.”_ Raven nodded slowly. - _"If you understand me, turn the page."_

Raven followed the instruction and found a leaflet from a video store, something she had not seen in Gotham for a long time. The address was exactly between one of the red dots on her map, as if the destination wanted her to be there anyway.

The instructions explicitly said that she should leave the book on the shelf of a Christmas movie that she considered the most depressing of all, and he would try to understand why. Raven looked at the clock, she could run to the bookstore, leave the book there, and go home before Rose noticed that she had ever gone out.

Raven tried to take confident steps to the video store, taking slow, calming breaths with each step, as she tried to remember which saddest, and most depressing film she had watched about Christmas. There was one, but she needed options B, C, D and E in case she didn't have option A.

The store was cozy, spacious, and had a 90s look to it. There were some shelves divided by theme, from fantasy to biography, with DVD and VHS movies.At the counter, a freckle faced girl with very short, dark hair, tried to explain to a boy that he couldn't deliver a film 7 years after borrowing it, without paying a late fee.

It would be quick, Raven would leave the notebook there and leave without the girl noticing. But her plans were thwarted when she tried to leave the store, confident enough with herself that she didn’t hear footsteps behind her, and the girl with short hair and freckles, holding her arm preventing her from going home.

\- "Wait. You are the notebook girl! ”

\- "No... You... What notebook?"

\- “No need to lie, I saw you leaving your notebook on the shelf. Come on, let's talk.” - She smiled excitedly. - "Ah, by the way my name is Mia Mizoguchi, but everyone calls me Maps." - She held out her hand to Raven without taking the smile off her face, waiting for Raven to shake it, and introduce herself.

\- "Raven." - Raven said, defeated, shaking the girl's hand.

\- “Nice to finally meet you, Raven. Do you like coffee? I know a cafeteria where we can talk better.”

\- "I... I prefer tea." - Raven stammered.

\- "Great, let's order tea with cookies! I love chamomile tea with cookies."

They walked to a coffee shop next to the video store and Raven sat at the table, feeling anxiety fill her, as Maps returned with their cups of tea. The notebook was next to Raven's hand, and she felt her chest almost hurt with anticipation.

Now things would go wrong, as they always did.

\- "He won't believe it when I say I managed to find out who you are!"

\- "Did he want you to spy on me?" - Raven wrinkled her nose, as she sipped the chamomile tea, trying to let the warm sensation of the liquid soothe her nerves.

\- "Actually, I think the word he used was 'trap'."

\- "You can't tell him you saw me, Maps."

\- "Why?"

\- "I don't want him to know who I am."

\- "But you don't want to meet him?"

\- "No." - Raven said firmly and Maps winced. - “I mean, not yet. I don’t know. I want to get to know him better, but it's easier with the notebook.”

\- "Okay." - Maps looked at the red notebook resting on the table. - "Okay, I can understand that."

\- "Great."

\- “But there is something I don't understand. Shouldn't you have put it next to a sad Christmas movie? _Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer_ is not sad. ”

\- “Reindeer are herbivores who would never hurt anyone. But it wouldn't stop the wildlife service from hunting the poor guy down.”

\- "Oh no!"

\- "Even if it was Grandma's fault that she got in the way."

\- "Gods, you both are the same when it comes to animals." - Maps widened her eyes, and Raven was a little surprised by the comment. - "But you're right, this is really sad!"

\- "Isn't?" - Raven saw a smile grow on Maps' face. Her heart gradually became calmer. It was not difficult to talk to someone like Maps, she seemed to be a girl who radiated joy, and it was easy to just talk about anything. Raven bet she had several friends. - “So... What is he like? Your friend.” - She asked, unsure of the answer.

\- "I don't think he would like me to answer."

\- "Is he snarly?"

\- "So... The expression my mother uses is _'finicky'_. He's... ”- She made a face -'' He's complicated, okay? He has many walls. But when he lets you in, he's the nicest friend you could ever have. Trust me."

\- "Can I...?" - Raven felt her heart miss a beat - "Trust you, I mean?"

\- “Well, you came, and I was busy with a customer. So it would be totally possible that you dropped off the notebook, and I never saw you.”

\- "Would you do that for me?"

\- "And for him."

\- "Why?"

\- "Because you are not _Emiko_." She raised her eyebrow, and Raven was confused. Emiko? - “But, look, you gotta at least leave something for him or he’ll never forgive me. Can you at least tell him your name?”

\- "No! He tried to trick me!” - Raven crossed her arms on the table. - "Unless... Your friend hates Christmas, right?"

\- "Yes..." - Raven smiled deviously, the idea flashing through her mind like a light bulb lighting up in the darkness. If he hated Christmas and had set a trap for her, a trip to Macy's would be punishment enough.

\- "Well, if he wants my name, he will have to earn it." - She smiled, and opened the notebook. - "He's going to have to ask Santa."

The instructions she left to the mysterious boy were simple. If he wanted to find out about her, it would have to be through the notebook, and only through the notebook. She would give him her name if he managed to take on the challenge.

He would have to risk his own dignity if he really wanted to know who she was. And if he did, it would be fun to know the story.

Maps assured her that she would help him meet the challenge at all costs. When Raven went home her heart was beating fast, the anxiety almost causing her to have a stroke.

There was a man who lived downstairs in Raven's apartment that she considered as a distant uncle. His name was Saul, but since Raven was a baby, she learned to call him uncle. He helped Angela a lot when she needed a fix or two once he got sober, and for the next 6 years, after Raven had told him that she didn't like meeting him at the door of the building sleeping and drunk.

Something about that man changed after that and he tried to improve. He had no children, the woman had died in childbirth, and so he thought of Raven as a daughter he can never have, the niece he could protect if he got well.

Saul saw Raven like an illuminated flower in that accursed city.

Raven just had to ask him to help her make a boy she was meeting to feel the energy of Christmas, and with that, he took the opportunity to see what kind of boy was approaching his flower. Rich boys there liked to approach girls like Raven, he had seen it happen over a thousand times.

He would not let any playboy with his branded outfits, and important names, turn off the light that Raven had.  
When night came, Raven could barely control herself inside the house. Rose tried to get her distracted by anything else. Even tried to get her to decorate the house for Christmas, but Raven couldn't think of anything that wasn't the time for Saul to come back from work at Macy's, so she could hear the news of what happened.

At 11:00 pm, Raven was unable to control herself any more. And even as the snow spiraled over her and started to fall from Gotham's dark sky, she patiently sat at the door of the building, waiting for Saul.

\- "Ho-Ho-Ho." - Raven heard in the distance and looked up, trying not to look as anxious as she really was. A few meters away, Saul was carrying his Santa Claus clothes and shouting through the neighborhood, announcing to Raven that he was coming.

\- "Uncle Saul!" - He smiled, seeing her get up quickly. Raven's heart was beating in her chest like the flutter of a bird's heart. Felt like it almost made it sore. - "Do you have something for me?"

\- "Yes..." - The man said smiling, taking the bag from his back to fish the red notebook from his coat pocket. - "He showed up at the end of my shift, his friend brought me a glass of milk and a plate of cookies." - He took a deep breath - “Look, Raven... I didn't like that boy. Your godparents and your mother wouldn't like him either.”

\- "My godparents are in Kansas..." - Raven said with a smile, - "And my mother in San Francisco."

\- “Well, I'm just taking care of you. Merry Christmas, child.” - He smiled giving Raven a kiss on the forehead, before entering the building with Raven right behind him running to her apartment, and throwing himself on the bed hugging the red notebook. Rose was on the roof eating cookies with Jay. He had arrived just before Raven came down to the door of the building, and was carrying cookies that his grandfather taught him how to do.

They would spend the night there on the roof. Raven considered it romantic and was happy that his relationship and Rose was not just a one-way relationship. Jay was also liking Rose.

Raven looked up at the ceiling, letting the scent of cinnamon spice fill her mind and form the image of a faceless boy, but one that made sense in her head. She let that image fall into her heart, that was beating tightly against her chest.

It was just... Animation throughout the dare game, right? She didn't like this mysterious boy.

She couldn't be liking this boy... It was just... exciting, to have someone like that, right?

She couldn't be liking someone she doesn't know. Raven opened the notebook again, looking at the message written in perfect calligraphy.

_“Dear Raven... You won. If we're going to do that, then I agree to follow your rules. No traps, no last names. No social media stalking. No pressure to meet. Personal questions are fair game. But they must be earned with a dare. Well, I did your dare. So, tell me, Raven..._

_What do you want for Christmas?"_


	4. a punk show

_**December 20 - 5:00 AM** _

_“What do I want for Christmas? I want to get to know you, notebook boy. Take me somewhere special. A place in the city that feels like you.”_

Raven walked the deserted streets with an idiotic smile on her face.

It was exciting and she could feel the adrenaline rushing through her veins and the air oxygenating her lungs. At 5:00 am all Gotham streete had were drunk people lying in the corners and vendors starting to look for the newspapers to open the newsstands. Was it dangerous? Of course, Raven knew Gotham's reputation for being the home of the world's scum.

And because of that, it was exciting.

The phrase in the red notebook, still in the hands covered by 2 thick gloves that she herself had knitted for the hellish winters in Gotham, echoed through her mind. What did she want for Christmas? What did she really want for Christmas?

There were so many things that she wanted. She wanted her mother in Gotham, she wanted her family together. She wanted to see the world, and wanted to be able to go to parties with people her age. She wanted Rose to finally have someone to love her, and she wanted to meet that mysterious boy who left the pages of her notebook smelling like cinnamon.

What would he be like? Did he have dark or light hair? Would he be tall? Or is it someone with stunted growth? Where in Gotham did he live?

Raven had so many questions. And what she wanted most that Christmas, were answers.

And she would have them, as soon as she was sure she was ready for it.

Raven walked on a carpet of white snow that led her to a building adorned with gargoyles situated right next to the largest building in the city. She opened the notebook again, reading the instructions left by the mysterious boy.

_“The most me isn’t a place, Raven. It's a time.”_ \- Raven took a deep breath and let her eyes follow the building's architecture. It looked old, but it had been restored by the Gotham revitalization project sponsored by Wayne industries. All the old, bad-looking buildings in Gotham were undergoing this revitalization. But nothing that playboy Bruce Wayne did would take away from the somber gray looking city that Gotham was. It was her nature. _“Be on the roof of the second tallest building in Gotham, close to the gargoyles, at 5:20 am. I know it's early but I promise... It's worth it.”_ \- Raven looked at the doors and found them closed But the doorkeeper in the building seemed to recognize her the moment he saw the notebook in her hand and let her in to use the elevator, and promised to give the notebook to the boy who had asked him for this favor when he left.

When she got to the roof, Raven looked at the watch on her wrist and it was 5:20 AM exactly. The cold wind beat hard against her face and she had to cover her cheeks with the hood of her coat to avoid freezing, but the view she had from there was beautiful.

Looking down, all you could see of Gotham was a city with dark buildings, fog, garbage and smoke. It wasn't a paradise, but it was what Raven called home. Up there, Raven saw that whole perception of the city change.

Gotham was beautiful in its own way, a unique city that had life. It looked like a large living organism in the midst of the star dust that was planet Earth. Raven smiled looking at the horizon, seeing the bay with its boats moored, and all the houses with people beginning to wake up for another day of work. Hearing the sounds of horns and sirens coming from the streets below.

The city coming to life.

Raven felt the urge to scream out to the city, but she definitely couldn't do that. Being branded crazy was not quite the fame she wanted to have, and stopping in Arkham was definitely not her greatest dream in life. So she stayed there, sitting on the edge of the roof, watching Gotham lazily waking up. The first rays of the sun were coming up on the horizon while she read some more of the boy's message in the notebook.

_“It is rare to find beauty and stillness in the middle of this city,to look beyond and see Gotham's beauty without being carried away by all the ugliness you see from the ground and the overwhelming crowds. Tell me what you're seeing and enjoy it while you can. People ruin everything.”_

Raven looked at the horizon and took in a breath of fresh, pure dawn air with her eyes closed, feeling her heartbeat slow and letting the calm of the moment bring her peace. Her eyes followed the skyline, where she could still see the traces of the night in the dark mantle of stars that covered the city. The sun had not yet risen in the east.

She wrote in detail in the notebook everything she saw and the way it all made her feel, unable to remove the smile of accomplishment from her lips, and without being able to remove that sense of achievement she felt on the inside. She went home soon after that, leaving the notebook with the kind porter who smiled when she thanked him for the experience.

_**December 20 - 9:40 AM** _

Damian hoped she had felt exactly how he felt when he ran away from the stresses of life by retreating to the tops of Gotham City's tallest buildings. There were the advantages of being the son of the owner of almost every building in the city.

Damian hardly waited for the sun to come out on the horizon before rushing to the Wayne Tech building when the doorman's message had arrived on his phone, saying that she had left the notebook for him.

It was a new anxiety that he didn't remember feeling before, it felt good. It made him smile almost without realizing it, and made him feel a warmth in his chest that he hadn't felt in a long time.

But as he had said, people screw everything up. He had to wait in line to get to the reception desk, and with that, people who were sucked into the screen of a mobile device and didn’t pay attention when they were called.

\- "It's your turn." - Damian said the girl in front of him, who was laughing, looking at the phone. - "Pay attention, the line has moved and it's your turn."

\- "Rude." - The woman said, rolling her eyes and walking towards the smiling good man, he said that she had stayed on the terrace for about 40 minutes, and then g receptionist. Finally Damian had managed to get close to the doorman who kept the notebook for him. He left thanking him for the experience. Damian couldn't help the smile growing on his face, she really had accepted the challenge and felt it in her soul. He didn’t even wait to get somewhere to read, he just read while walking among the noisy people who didn’t look where they were going.

_"I... I am seeing the horizon and the first rays of sun on the water that bathes the bay. There is a light breeze against my face, and even though the sun is rising, it is still dark. But here above me, the sky is lit by the beautiful constellations. The world looks big and small at the same time... And it's all mine. Well, I know now that you like quiet, but you don't have to wake up so early for that you don’t even have to go to the highest place in the city. You just need a meditation lesson with Professor Azar at Robinson Park.”_

Damian looked at the GPS, it was not far from Robinson Park, about 4 blocks.

He didn't walk around Gotham much, he went the same way he always did: Penthouse, Mansion, Wayne company building, Bludhaven, airport. He never let himself walk in the city parks, he only went to the Botanical Gardens when there was a Wayne Industries event that he had to attend, and for that reason, here he was discovering a Gotham that he did not know.

_“Be in the park at 11 a.m. and show the teacher the notebook. She is a Zen master. She neutralizes any type of noise. If you can last 10 minutes doing the complete and silent meditation of the Azarathians, then leave the notebook and your next challenge with her, and our game can continue. And one more thing: it's time I knew your name. Fair is fair."_

Damian looked at the woman sitting on the green grass in the park. She had long, lovely hair as white as the snow falling from the sky. She wore a red tunic with gold accents and lots of rings on her fingers and beautiful star earrings. On her forehead, she had a blood-red stone.

He put the stopwatch on the clock and addressed the woman sitting in the meditation position. Meditate? Pft, that was easy.

It was what Damian had thought, but sitting for 10 long minutes in one position, controlling his breathing, and trying to find inner peace, required more attention from him than he expected. After much trying, he managed to find what she was talking about.

Meditating and finding stillness within yourself could be difficult, but he succeeded, and it was as satisfying as climbing up on a roof in the middle of the night to look at the stars and watch the day dawn. Damian bowed to the master and left the red notebook next to her bag, feeling strangely good after more-than 10-minutes-meditating.

This was messing with him. Making him discover things that didn’t interest him before, and as strange as it was, he was enjoying it. How could anyone feel these things for someone they didn't know? For someone he only knew had the strange smell of lavender and a beautiful cursive handwriting.

What was she like? Did she have dark hair? Would she be tall or short, eyes light or dark?

Damian shook his head, smiling as he looked up at the sky announcing more snow for that day, while walking back to the penthouse. Those were questions he didn't want to ask now. He wanted to continue the day with that stillness in his soul and the good feeling that the scent of lavender and vanilla gave him.

_**December 21 - 11:00 AM** _

Raven went to Master Azar at lunch and found the notebook there. After an hour of meditation, she lay on the grass reading what Damian had felt while meditating and if he had managed to meditate.

Gradually, Raven getting to know a little more about him

And little by little, he knew a little more about her world.

_“Dear Raven, I value fairness, but I cannot tell you my name. It's very specific. You would discover too easily who I am. But I give you a hint: my name is derived from Greek and can mean the one who tames. My mother gave me that name because she expected great things from me. She said that I would be the next Alexander the Great, but sometimes I feel that I have disappointed her by not meeting these expectations. Well, trying to find inner stillness in the middle of Gotham City, without it involving punching annoying pre-teenagers who torment meditation masters, made me hungry. Let's have a snack. Find the Syrian-Lebanese restaurant between Otto Avenue and 1st Street and order the Sirian bread and Babaganoush.”_

Raven followed the instructions as he directed in the notebook. It was a restaurant with a familiar and simple atmosphere in the middle of the luxurious buildings on Otto Avenue. Raven wondered if he was an Arab or if he just liked regional food. They had few tables and were run by a smiling and inviting family.

She tried the delicacy that was equally delicious and spicy, determined to buy one for Rose to try as well. Rose was very interested in the development of this friendship between the two lately, and Jay was spending most of the time in the apartment with them, this had proved to be more fun than she expected.

Jason was fun, funny and sometimes even clumsy. Christmas was not at all lost if she could have Jay and Rose make her laugh, and this strange boy from the notebook. Raven had outlined her plan by using the people she knew, who would then be able to tell her when to get the notebook. She hoped he had done the same.

_**December 21 - 14:40 PM** _

Damian couldn't stay at home, he found himself again, waiting for the message saying she had gone to the restaurant. When he got the message, he ran towards the restaurant, almost bumping into people on the way, and ignoring the queue of customers that were going to place their orders.

He didn't want to eat, he wanted the notebook. Damian smiled when he saw her perfectly written letters and smelled the scent of lavender and vanilla that she always left on the pages. There were instructions for him to go to a cafeteria in old Gotham and he followed them like an obedient dog.

His Christmas wasn't so bad with that mischevious girl for company.

_“Punishment for asking your name? Because you can put all the Asian pepper on me you want, but I will not give up. In fact, Babaganoush was very tasty, thanks for the indication. Okay, derived from Greek and it means the one who tames, and your mother associated it with Alexander the Great...? Damon? Alex? I'll call you Alex... So, Alex, do you mean you like salty things? I like things that are very sweet. I know you say you hate Christmas, but for me, it's the sweetest time of the year. So, try some Christmas Cannolis and tell me about your best Christmas. I know that even you have had at least one.”_

Damian sat at one of the tables and ordered tea with Christmas Cannolis, not even wondering what those could be, but when a huge plate of sweet cookies came in front of him, he could almost hear Alfred telling him he would have a toothache for eating so many cookies.

Damian took a deep breath and looked at the notebook, fiddling with the memories he didn't want to go through his mind. For a moment, Damian could almost feel that she was there, sitting in the chair across from him and ready to listen to his troubles.

When Raven went to the cafeteria that same day, the waitress told her that the instructions the boy in the green shirt had left, were for her to leave the notebook there and Raven understood that as part of his challenge. She found the notebook on one of the tables as if he had just left. The cup with the tea he drank was on one side of the table, and on the other an empty plate that had contained the Christmas Cannolis that he was supposed to eat.

Raven almost imagined that she could see him there. Looking at her and waiting for her to say something to him, while he listened carefully.

She knew they had a different connection than she had with all the other people in her life. Three days of meeting each other through a notebook and Raven felt like she had never felt with anyone before.

_“To start with, my name isn’t anything like Alex. Alex’s are naive, simple-minded, have unrefined taste. An Alex would never have found you between Pride & Prejudice editions at Gotham Bookstore. As for your challenge, when I was about 10 years old, my mother finally let me know my father. She raised me inside walls on the other side of the ocean, and all these cultures and parties that you have here, weren’t part of my daily life because to my grandfather, they were a waste of time. When I arrived in Gotham, my family's butler, who was like a grandfather to all of us, did everything he could to enter me into these customs and make me feel like a child like any other. He passed away a year and a half ago, and even with the pain of losing someone as important to me as my butler, I survived. So, in the end, my best Christmas was in the last year that I still believed in the magic of this time of year, miracles or loved ones living forever. But enough about me, I don't want to be brooding alone, Rae.”_\- Raven smiled, had he called her ‘Rae’? Was that... sweet? - _“Tell me about your worst Christmas. I know that even you must have had one.”_

Raven thought for a long moment about what she was going to write and she even wrote about her worst Christmas, until she realized that there were worse Christmases than what she had written. Things that had happened a long time ago that Raven chose to hide in her emotional chest and never rummage through again because she had hurt too much.

The reason why she is alone and insecure with herself.

He had opened up to her with something personal, and it was probably very painful for him, and she was just thinking about how lonely she was this Christmas. Even so, it was not all bad. After all, she had Rose and Jay now, and she spent considerable time teaching them how to make cookies, as well as having Rose sleeping in the apartment with her, even if it was on the roof. They even decorated the house and went to Robinson Park to see the lights as was tradition.

No, that wasn't her worst Christmas, her worst Christmas was another.

_**December 21 - 15:10 PM** _

Damian looked at the chair that was pulled out in front of the table where he sat before leaving the notebook. He could imagine her there, with her Cannolis and her cup of tea. Did she like chamomile tea?

He could imagine the smile on her pink lips because the cup she left was marked with nude pink lipstick. On instinct, he licked his bottom lip thinking about what it would be like to finally meet her there and hear her talk about her life. To take her home, and in the end, be able to kiss her.

Damian shook his head, dismissing that thought.

They didn't even know each other. They corresponded for three days and she made him do crazy things, like stealing the cap of an old Santa Claus costume in a department store during Christmas shopping hours. It's not like they're living in a fairy tale, right?

Fairy tales didn’t exist.

It was a fun game for both of them where they met new people and discovered new places. A game for lonely souls.

Damian opened the notebook with a sigh, pushing those feelings that grew to the bottom of his chest.

_“Worst Christmas? How about this year?”_ \- The force she put in the pen said she was angry, she had left marks on the next pages in her notebook. - _“My mom is in San Francisco having a vacation without me, and my godparents are in Kansas. I don't know my dad, and they left me with a friend who spends most of her time having sex with her new boyfriend in the guest room. No comments."_ \- Damian raised his eyebrows and tried to stifle a laugh with his hands. - _“So, I would say that my worst Christmas is this one. But it would be a lie.”_ \- Any laugh that Damian tried to stifle, died instantly. He felt like she was there in front of him. He could almost imagine a girl in his head with black hair and fun clothes, telling him her whole life. He didn't know why, but somewhere in his mind he kept the image of the girl who bumped into him before he entered Gotham's Bookstore. And every time Damian seemed to feel the girl in the notebook nearby, he projected this girl. - “ _You told me something personal, traumatic. So I think I owe you the same. My worst Christmas was in the year of friendship bracelets at school, when I was still studying in Metropolis. I begged my mother to go to the winter ball, I was only 10 and it was difficult for her to cross the bridge for just one school dance, but she allowed it. I've always loved doing things like making my own clothes. Like my godmother, whom I affectionately call Mrs. Basil E, says: Your clothes are the expression of your interior. It was my first ball and I wanted to be friends with everyone there, so I made friendship bracelets as a Christmas present for everyone. I chose the forgotten fabrics at the back of the store. those that nobody cares about and don’t want to buy, because in some way, I identified with them. There was a boy, I'll call him "Gar", who had never spoken to me before, but he was the funniest and most popular boy in the class. And there he was, claiming one of my creations, one of my friendship bracelets. It made me feel anxious and happy, not because he seemed to have all the girls under some kind of spell, but because he was someone who was seen as 'cool'. All his friends were looking at me and I could only think that this was my moment. That everything would be all right now, because I would finally have friends, and even the popular boy from school had spoken to me. How naive I was.”_ \- Damian felt something bubbling up inside him, anger, and he didn't know where it came from. - _“When I walked around the room and I started to find my bracelets, all the work I had done, thrown on the floor like trash. Scorned as I was every day. And in a corner, talking to his friends was "Gar", they all laughed about something... Laughed at my friendship bracelets... Laughed at me. Then I heard it perfectly when he called me a freak while throwing the bracelet I had made in the trash can.”_

\- "What a jerk!" - Damian declared to the book, getting up from his chair and walking out of the cafeteria. He wandered aimlessly through the city, that anger bubbling up even stronger inside him. She didn't deserve this.

_“Until that moment, I thought that I had fit in, that I would always fit in. All I had to do was just be myself, weird and fatherless, a Gotham girl with my weird earrings and fun hairstyles. I wasn’t a freak, I was just different. I was only 10 years old, but it still marked me like a hot coal. And every time I thought about trying to be a normal girl, the voice of "Gar" saying that I was a freak echoed in my head. After that, I started to feel like Alice in Wonderland, thinking that school was full of meaningless rules. Like, if you want them to like you, you couldn’t be yourself. I didn't want to study in Metropolis anymore. I accepted that my place was in Gotham, with all its oddities and picturesque things, isolated from the rest of the world. Exactly like how I was. And okay, sure, being myself meant that I didn’t go to big parties full of friends. Actually, I don't go to parties and I'm never even invited anyway. What I do, apparently, is vent about embarrassing childhood traumas with a stranger in a notebook. It is easier to admit these things to a stranger. Maybe it chased you away. But if not, and I hope not... Leave your next challenge at the Wayne Botanical Garden in the care of the patron saint of weird girls: the statue of Alice, the patron saint of girls who dare to be themselves._

Damian walked directly to the Botanical Garden, writing his next message as he walked, not caring that this time his handwriting was awful. For some reason he didn’t understand, he felt the need to make her feel accepted just the way she was, but when he put the notebook on the statue, he saw that what he had written was a lot of nonsense. And way too weird nonsense even for acceptable weird standards of it. Damian ripped the sheet up angrily and walked directly to the movie store where he knew Maps would be. Maybe she had a better idea than just writing something stupid to a girl who had a childhood trauma involving bullying and isolation.

\- "Was it that bad?" - Maps asked, making a face, while sipping a cup of coffee.

\- “Honestly, the first thing I wrote was how I wanted to go back in time and just end the evil little twerp that called her ‘freak’. And I described the whole thing, like exactly how I would do it, which actually included a plan for a fairly credible time machine, but I didn't want to look stupid, so I threw it away.”

\- "Aw, it’s so cute how protective you are over your paper girlfriend."

\- "She's not my girlfriend."

\- "She’s kind of your girlfriend at this point, right?"

\- "No. It's just a game, Maps.”

\- “I’m pretty sure she is your girlfriend. And you are really enjoying it... And that's a good thing. ”

\- "No, no… Stop that, stop that." - Damian said smiling, and tapping the notebook on Maps' shoulder. At that same moment, a man with blond hair and a beige coat came in along with another who had long black hair and a leather jacket.They began tearing old ads off the board and replacing it with a new ad.

\- “Hey guys, don't tear it all up like that!”

\- "Dude, it's all old."

\- "But you are messing up everything."

\- "Dude, I'm making way for the new one."

\- "This is urgent, dude." - The guy with long hair spoke, pointing to the ad. Maps' eyes flashed and she opened her mouth in a perfect O. Damian actually knew that middle-aged guy with blond hair and a beige coat.

_John Constantine_. An annoying Brit who was occasionally involved in his family's problems.

\- "Oh, the bloody little bat."

\- "John Constantine."

\- "I can’t believe you are going to do a show!" - Maps almost had a fangirling attack. - “Are you going to play a show in Gotham? A secret show?”

\- "Underground, girl... Underground."

\- "Aren't you a little old for this punk band show thing?" - Damian rolled his eyes.

\- "One more show less than one in the middle of this mystical mess that humans get into is nothing much..." - He shrugged - "Besides, is there something more punk than going against a system that says that can't I be punk??”

\- "But, you forgot the address." - Maps said, raising her eyebrows while looking at the pamphlet.

\- "It's a secret and underground show, man."

\- “Here in the pamphlet there is a picture of a Challah bread. The show is going to be today, on the seventh night of Hanukkah because our drummer is Jewish, so put the dots together.”

\- "The Jewish bakery at Cornerstone Court?"

\- "Exactly." - John said, cracking a smile while lighting another cigarette.

\- "It's tonight?" - Damian repeated, the idea of his next dare appearing in his mind like a light bulb lighting up in the middle of a dark room. Didn't she mention that she doesn't go to parties because of trauma? That would be a good start.

\- "Didn't we just say it is on the seventh night of Hanukkah, which by the way is today?"

\- "Great" - Damian said smiling, as he took the pamphlet they had just hung, and his eyes shone like burning stars.

\- "Hey!"

\- "I need it."

\- "You're going?" - Constantine frowned. - "The annoying baby bat is going?"

\- "Of course not... But a friend will be..." - Damian smiled. - "Besides, do you need any help? Because I need a favor from you.”

_**December 21 - 5:00 pm** _

Raven walked through Robinson Park looking for the notebook on Alice's statue, which was next to a water fountain that spurted water of a doubtful origin, but she couldn't see any sign of something red there. Had someone taken off with her correspondence book? Or had he left nothing there? She might have scared him with her stupid story about a traumatic episode from her childhood involving fabric bracelets, and a boy she didn't even really know..

Garfield was an idiot with everyone, it would be no different with her.

Raven was about to give up looking for the notebook when her eyes fell on where the statue's hand pointed, and she saw a red tip in all that darkness of the statue's rusty steel.

It was there. Of course it was there.

The mysterious boy had hidden the notebook in a space under the statue's hand so that no one could find it. No one but her.

Raven felt her heart fill with that feeling she always had when she thought of him, and wondered again what he would be like.

She opened the notebook right away, finding the page marked with red ribbon and a folded pamphlet. Raven opened the pamphlet and found the announcement of a concert, but it had nothing but the name of a punk band that Raven had heard a few times in her life.  
She opened the notebook and read the message trying to find any sign.

_“Dear Raven. This guy you call "Gar" is an asshole. You are a unique and different girl, and believe me, the different part does not always mean that it is bad. If you were not a freak, I wouldn't have met you in the classic Jane Austen book section at Gotham Bookstore. Being weird and what people usually call a freak, is cool, Raven. And I will prove it. Tonight will change your life. Come on, get excited and trust me. You'll know where to be at 2 a.m. in the only bakery that serves challah bread in Gotham.”_

_Oh no._

Raven walked home thinking of things she could say to not have to go there. She did not go to parties, clubs, or places that required her to leave her house after 10 p.m. She couldn't do this, she couldn't go to that.

Rose noticed that Raven had been silent in her room for over an hour after she had arrived, and for a brief moment, she thought that something serious had happened. The girl had spent two whole days leaving early, and coming back at the end of the night with a silly smile on her face, and now she came back with a worried face instead? Definitely something must have happened.

\- "Do you want to tell me something?" - Rose said, appearing at the door of Raven's room, an eyebrow raised and arms crossed, - "Someone I need to kill and hide their body?"

\- "What?" - Raven opened her mouth and closed it again. - "No... No, nothing happened."

\- “So what about this? Since the day you left this notebook at Gotham Bookstore, you have come home every day with a huge smile on your face. Yesterday when you left it wasn't even 5 a.m. and you didn’t come back until the end of the day, and today... You look like a dead plant.” - Raven let a breath out slowly, taking the flyer out of the notebook, and showing it to Rose.

\- "It's a punk show." - Rose looked at the pamphlet and then looked at Raven in surprise

\- “A punk show involving magic? _Magicore_? Damn, I love Gotham!”

\- “Help me get away from this. I can say that I am sick. That I was bitten by a spider and that I couldn't go.” - Raven grimaced. - “No, to say that would be stupid. You can go, take the notebook and say that I was stung! ”

\- "Or, you just go to that show." - Rose said, placing her hands on Raven's shoulder.

\- "No, I can not go!"

\- "Why?"

\- "Because the show is at 2 a.m."

\- "To me you are making excuses."

\- “I will just do something embarrassing. Then he will be disappointed and stop responding to me.”

\- “Look,” - Rose grimaced, she took the notebook from the dresser on the side of Raven's bed and showed her, - “You already did several challenges for this guy, several ‘embarrassing things’. What is the difference now?”

\- "Because..." - Raven huffed and looked at her hands. - "Because it's too early to say this but, with each new dare, I know a little more about him and... I think I'm starting to like him. What if I screw it up?”

\- "Raven... This guy stole a Santa's hat at Macy's just to know your name, he went to meditate in the damn cold to fulfill a challenge you proposed... I don't know if it's really early but... he should mean something to you. This guy is into you in some way. Because he liked what he knew about you.”

\- "Hi Rae!" - Jay said, wrapping himself in a blanket up to his head. Raven almost forgot that Jason was there almost every day.

\- "Hi Jay!"

\- "What did you do today Rae?"

\- "I ate Arab food"

\- "If this boy wasn't flirting with you, I could have sworn he's my little brother..."

\- "Do you have a younger brother?" - Rose asked, looking at Jay with a funny face. - “You never told me about him.

\- “Ah yes, I have a younger brother who is... Weird in his own way. But there is no way he could be doing it because he's in San Francisco with his weird friends, and he definitely wouldn't go around doing crazy things like a normal teenager... He's a 95 year old man inside a teenager's body.”

\- "Want to know something? You will have to tell me about your family sometime.” - Rose said smiling, signaling Jason to sit next to her.

\- “When we don't have anything interesting to do with my mouth, I'll tell you everything you want about my family. Jesus, I'm in love with this duvet.”

\- "What?" - Rose squeaked, hugging Jason under the duvet too. - "And what about me?"

\- "Diabetes!" - Raven hummed

\- "Can we take it to the roof tonight?"

\- "Sure we can"

\- "Are you going to sleep on the roof again?"

\- "It's very cold, but it's super-romantic."

\- "It's like camping in Antarctica... Or at the Oswald Cobblepot bar"

\- "Really..." - Rose said laughing and turning to kiss Jay. - "Oh god, you are so smart."

\- "You are"

\- "No, you are."

\- "Or you could go with me..." - Raven said, raising an eyebrow, as Jay and Rose looked at her from the corner of their eyes and suddenly stopped kissing.

\- "And leave the house?"

\- "Go where?"

\- "My little friend here is afraid of a party."

\- "Why is that? Don't you like going to parties?”

\- "I just never went to one."

\- "So what do you do for fun?"

\- “She sews her own clothes and meditates in Robinson Park.” - Rose snorted. - “And sometimes she plays chess with old people in nursing homes. Please Jay, let's turn her into a teenager!”

\- "I'm open to this, but... What about you, Rae?" - Raven licked her lower lip, feeling anxious. She didn't quite know what to feel about the idea of going out at night to a party filled with people she didn't know, but she also didn't feel it would be fair to make that boy do crazy things and when it was her turn, she would chicken out.

\- "Okay..." - Raven said, shrugging. - "But I don't know how to get ready for this."

\- "Leave it to us..." - Rose said, smiling.

\- "Rae, I know everything there is to know about going out at night... I even have a bar!"

\- "Let Jay and Rose to prepare you mentally, and fabulously."

\- "This is going to hurt?" - Raven said, making a face and holding back laughter.

\- "Don't depend on me" - Jay said, smiling.

\- "Let's start with the clothes" - Rose said, after standing up. - "Oh gods I feel like the fairy godmother of Cinderella." - She walked over to Raven's closet and went through the hangers.

\- "You said you like to make your own clothes, right?" - Jay said, sitting across from her. - "Why?"

\- "I like to express myself as I am."

\- "Perfect!" - Jay cracked another smile.

\- "You need something that is you, but bigger, sexier." - Rose said, looking at her with amusement - “Now tell me, what have you always wanted to wear, but never had the courage? Or maybe you didn't find the perfect time to wear it?”

Raven thought about it for a few seconds and then smiled, remembering the blue dress she had found a while ago in a thrift store, but she never wore it because she didn't feel the confidence or the time for it.

She stood up and pulled the box from under her bed, taking the dress by the straps while she showed it to them. Their features were of complete surprise. The dress was a bright light blue, very fitted to the body, with sequins on the bust and a fringed skirt underneath. It looked like it came straight from the set of Moulin Rouge.

\- "My God! That dress is perfect! It's scandalous!”

\- “I found it in a thrift store and went for it,” - Raven said smiling - “but I would never wear it in public. Never. I can’t!"

\- "Aww, little bird." - Rose smiled mischievously, looking at Raven excited with the dress against her body - “Cute... This is the night! You are going to blow that place up with this blue dress!”

\- "And blue boots!" - Jay said, laughing and pointing to the blue wellies that Raven had kept in the corner of the room.

\- "I..." - Raven shrugged. - "I don't know..."

\- "Trust us both, Raven..." - Rose said, feeling excited for her friend - "Everything will be fine and you will be beautiful."

Raven looked at the dress again in her hands before letting out the breath she was holding and nodding yes, receiving a tight hug from Rose and Jay amidst laughter and screams.  
Rose made sure to explain to Raven how she would put her hair and what kind of makeup she would wear, and even made a list of things Raven shouldn't be doing at a party like this. Alcoholic beverage? No way.

And when the bedside clock rang at 10 pm, Raven decided that she needed to get some sleep to try to calm her heart's anxiety.

It didn't help at all, actually. At 1:00 a.m. she woke up scared with the sound of the phone alarm. She had been having a nightmare involving darkness, neon masks, and a boy wearing a mask covering his eyes who said he didn't even want to talk to her because he thought that she was a freak.

For a brief moment, Raven thought about giving up.

Give up everything before she could get hurt. It was what she did best.

But it was now or never and if she didn't do it now, she would die of regret, and she would fail with a boy who faced Santa Claus just to know a little more about her. A boy who was taking her beyond the comfort zone she knew.

She dressed up exactly as Rose had instructed her. And after breathing a few times in front of the mirror, Raven left the house carrying only the money for the taxi, a lipstick, her phone and a great deal of anxiety within her heart.

_"Trust me."_

There was only one bakery in Gotham that Raven knew was from a Jewish family. They certainly had more, she knew that Kane and the Cobblepot were powerful Jewish families in Gotham, but a place where they had enough space for an underground show and it was a bakery? Just there, at Cornerstone Court, in old Gotham, near the pier.

Raven took a deep breath while looking at the blinking neon sign, as a low, muffled sound came from somewhere she couldn't say. She felt her heart pounding against her ribs almost to the point that it hurt.

_“If you're looking at a neon sign at Cornerstone Court, congratulations Raven. You came."_

Raven looked everywhere, but nothing told her how to enter the party, until a drag queen came out of the bakery with a smile on her lips. It took Raven a few long seconds to recognize who she was under all those feathers, wigs and makeup: Old Macy's elf.

\- "Hi!" - Raven said, letting out her breath, relieved to find someone who seemed to be going to a party. - "I'm looking for a punk show that was supposed to happen around here."

\- "What is your rock bottom, baby?"

\- "What?"

\- "What afflicts you on this beautiful night?"

\- "Does something need to afflict me?" - Raven frowned, confused.

\- "If you want to enter, yes." - The drag smiled at Raven. - "Are you going to tell me that your little world is perfect?"

\- "It's Christmas and my mother is gone."

\- “Oh my gosh... Babe, I'm so sorry! How long has it been since she passed away?”

\- "Oh no. She is not dead, she is in San Francisco.”

\- "Girl, get out of here!"

\- "No! Wait! I need to get in there.”

\- "No."

\- "I need to find someone!"

\- "Not in there."

\- "No, but the guy inside will take me to another guy and ..." - Raven groaned, - "I don't want to spend the rest of my life playing chess with old people from nursing homes!"

\- “Then give me some pain! I need a real drag. What is so important.”

\- "I've never been kissed!" - Raven almost screamed, feeling the words leave her mouth without being able to stop them, but feeling as if she took a ton or weight off her back.  
She had never been kissed, and until then, it never seemed to bother her. And it shouldn't bother her, but she couldn’t help when she dreamed of it. She dreamed of her love story to be told at Christmas, of being a girl like any other girl her age. She dreamed that someone would accept her with the weird way she was, and kiss her on the lips, and make her feel all those things that people said they felt when being kissed.

And when she finally found someone who accepted her and all her weirdness, she started to dream that maybe it would be her turn.

\- "How old are you?"

\- "I am 17 years old."

\- "Oy." - Macy's elf/drag queen sighed and then looked at Raven. - "Okay, come with me." - She signaled with her hand for Raven to follow her, and then she opened a door at the back of the bakery that led to a basement. The music grew louder and seemed to make the small staircase that appeared in front of her shake. From inside, Raven heard the sound of a punk band whose music seemed mixed with some kind of magic.

John Constantine, the vocalist, was known not only for his vocal ability and British accent, but also for being a sorcerer. Raven had heard something from them when she was 14 and she really liked their punk style.

She felt it could be a nice night, if she wasn't so afraid. The drag queen made room for her and signaled her to go down the stairs with a smile on her face. Raven considered several ways to just run from there to a nearby taxi stand. It didn't feel safe and was several miles away from her comfort zone.

\- "Look here girl... Go down there and fix this!"

\- "Thanks!"

\- "Go down the rabbit hole, Alice." - She smiled knowingly at Raven tilting her head to the side. Raven looked at her for a few seconds wondering if it was just a coincidence or if it was something that the mysterious boy spoke to that drag queen about.

It could just be her paranoia.

Raven filled her lungs with air before placing the first foot on the stairs, and then the second, and before she knew it, she was in front of a stage playing loud music and people dancing around her. Before walking among the people, Raven opened the notebook, taking advantage of the low light to read again the message that the boy had left for her.

_"Now just play, Raven... And be the best freak version of yourself you can be."_

She closed her eyes and repeated to herself a few times that everything would be okay. Then she took a few steps forward, looking around still a bit shy and feeling her heart pounding against her chest. Would he be there? Would he try to see if she could do it?

While walking around and thinking about these possibilities, dreaming about who he could possibly be in there, Raven accidentally bumped into a waitress who looked her up and down with disgust.

_Oh no..._

\- "Excuse you? Rude." - She wrinkled her nose and rolled her eyes, before leaving mumbling about how bad people were in Gotham. Raven tried to apologize, but everything started to get worse, and she ran into two other girls while she walked away from the waitress.

\- "Hey!"

\- "Sorry."

\- "She is my friend!" - One of the girls said, going to try to get satisfaction from Raven and backing her into a corner.

\- "No, I just..."

\- "Know what? We are not going to put up with Tiffany's antics or yours.” - The other girl said, clearly too drunk to notice that she didn't know Raven, and that it wasn't her fault.

It had just been an accident.

Raven pulled away, trying to run away, but bumped into someone else. The glass of beer she was holding spilled all over her, soiling her face, hair and the dress she wore.

\- "Hey! Look what you did! I just got this drink and you made me spill it all!”

It was the last straw for Raven. She wanted to run, wanted to cry, wanted to leave. She was afraid to do anything else that would get her in trouble and she was afraid of being ridiculed. Without looking at the queue that was forming, Raven ran to the bathroom, ignoring the screams that told her to wait in line.

Inside the safety that was the bathroom, she locked the door and leaned against it. Trying to prevent it from opening with the punch that the person in line began to give it, ordering her to open and get out of there.

She couldn't do it and she should have known that. Not even 5 minutes went by and all she got were people being rude to her and a bath of beer. Raven walked to the small mirror and took some toilet paper to wipe the beer from her face. She didn't know if her burning eyes was because of the beer that had splashed her face, or if it was because she wanted to cry.

Raven's eyes roamed the mirror. It was filled with messages and graffiti, and to her surprise, in the middle of that dirty mirror, written in a blue pen, there was a message specifically for her.

_“Go back outside, Raven. :)”_

Raven didn’t notice the small single tear running down her cheek. How did he know she would run to the bathroom? How in so little time, did he know her like this? Raven let the tears come out of her eyes and run down her cheek, but they were tears of relief. She was not alone, and somehow that strange and mysterious boy she only knew from a notebook made her feel normal. Her tears were mixed with a smile that she couldn't help.

Raven took the lipstick from the bag and wrote a message without knowing if he would ever read it. She needed to get it off her chest, make it real, and then go outside to try again. Try because she couldn't give up on the first hurdle.

She looked at the message written in the mirror and took a deep breath. She focused on remembering feeling the breeze on her face when she climbed on the roof at dawn. And remembering how she felt that the whole world was hers as she watched Gotham wake up right in front of her. And then he left, ignoring the protests of people outside while walking among dancing bodies.

\- "Where are the bloody subversives!" - John Constantine's perfect English sounded over the speakers followed by a wave of screams, and applause. and whistles. - “A basic lesson for you who don't know the punk movement, you bastards. Punk was born around 1974 in the USA and gained strength around the world. Becoming a big social movement with ideas established at the end of the decade on the streets of London. The punk movement is resistance, and against fucking prejudice, against the bloody Nazism and fascism. It's facing oppressors and this fucking society.” - A wave of screams and whistles began again. - “This is the spirit of punk! Facing your bastard oppressors, not being defined by others. This is fucking punk!” - Raven closed her eyes and smiled, letting those words enter her mind as if they were made for her. as she walked among the people. - “Ready to face oppression and look your demons in the face and tell them to fuck off? Then make some noise!"

The sound filled the space again, accompanied by the sound of guitars and rebelliously sarcastic lyrics. People then began jumping around awkwardly and bumping into each other. Raven was afraid that her weirdness was weirder than those people so she was content to just watch them dance, even though her feet couldn't stay still.

\- "Raven?" - Donna's voice came from somewhere that were hard for Raven's eyes to see, she ran and gave the girl a big hug.

\- “My God, Donna ?! What are you doing here?"

\- "Are you kidding me? This band is insane. And you?"

\- "It's a long story."

\- “Well, it's nice to see you. I love your boots!” - Donna smiled, hugging Raven again. - "Will you stay here? I'll get you something to drink, if you want...? ”

\- “I'm fine, Donna. I'm just going to... experience things.”

\- "Okay... See you later." - She smiled again, walking away from Raven and leaving her alone once more to watch people have fun her way.

\- "Cute." - The drag queen Christmas elf spoke holding Raven's shoulder, almost making her die of fright. - "You won't be kissed if you stand in a corner. Come, let's go to the middle." - She reached out, taking her hand and pulling her to the center of the floor.

\- "No..."

\- "Excuse me, we're going.. into the Hurricane." - She grunted as she pulled Raven into the eye of the hurricane. - “You look beautiful, so rock it, okay? Show what you are capable of and kick that fear away from here ... ”

She gave Raven a sincere smile and a light handshake before walking away. She considered ways to return to her safe darkness, but there was this voice inside her telling her to try. If she wanted to stay in the dark, she should have stayed at home. Raven took a shaky breath, letting the air in through her nose and out through her mouth, starting with simple but strange steps, trying to dance in her own way.

Gradually, Raven let herself be carried away by the melody, and her body moved without being afraid of it. She could smile and dance as she wanted, and people would dance with her. She could be weird, jump and sway and run around the stage and people would dance with her. She could have fun.

Getting out of the bubble wasn’t that bad. And being weird felt good.

\- "John!" - Gary shouted. - “John, the red notebook, look! It's the baby bat’s girl!”

Raven was having her best time, having fun like she never had fun before, smiling like she never smiled before, until someone called her name.

\- "Raven?" - She looked up to see who was calling her. Could it be the boy in the notebook?  
Standing next to her was a boy with green hair, wearing a red and white jacket and eyes every bit as green as his hair.

\- "Notebook boy?"

\- "Notebook? No... I'm Garfield, we studied together in elementary school! ” - Oh no.

Hearing that name started to bring unwanted memories back to Raven. Why him? Why did she have to find the boy who made her have social phobia? She tried to move, tried to fight her demon from the past, tried to say something, but she felt trapped, caged, cornered.

\- "G-Garfield?"

\- “Dude, I knew it was you. How random to see you here. Dance a lot, huh?”

\- "Y-Did you see everything?"

\- "Wait..." - He looked at the notebook in Raven's hands with a grimace, as if holding a laugh. No, she wasn't experiencing that again. - “Did you bring a notebook to the party? Dude, you're so freaky! ”

_Oh._

Raven felt everything coming, all memories of the past mixed with the present. He couldn't be the boy in the notebook, because the boy in the notebook wouldn't make her go through the traumas she had opened with him. Traumas that made her never want to be herself because she knew she would be seen as wrong, as weird.

_As a freak._

Being a freak wasn't supposed to be good, and that guy in front of her always seemed to be there to remind her.

She was weird, she was different.

And different wasn’t welcome.

Raven's only reaction was to run, as she always did. She wanted to go home more than ever, the weight of that sentence almost felt unbearable on her back. She ran as fast as she could, without looking back, without thinking twice as the tears ran down her face again.  
In a hurry to get out of there and hear nothing else, Raven didn’t see the ice accumulating on the cobblestones and slipped, falling into a puddle. Why were these things happening to her? Why did the gods take pleasure in seeing her have the least amount of happiness while being shattered like that. Raven didn't even notice that one of her boot's was left behind in the puddle of water and ice when she got into the taxi.

And she didn't notice that she had forgotten to leave the notebook.

Raven felt frustrated when the taxi started to move. Frustrated with failing the notebook boy, failing the punk spirit, and failing herself. She didn't face her oppressor and had forgotten to leave the notebook to the only person who seemed to understand her.

How was he going to find her now? The answer was simple, he wouldn’t.

And he shouldn't really, Raven thought. Not just because she was all weird, but because she was a failure who would always be triggered by a word that meant that she was out of the ordinary, that she didn’t belong. Raven just wanted to tuck under the covers and forget that it had all happened. She would keep the good times as distant memories, and one day when she was white-haired and full of cats at home, she would remember how cowardly she was.

Raven was eating away at her misery when she noticed something strange. It was 4:00 a.m. and the apartment door was open. All the warning bells went off in Raven's head. All she could think was, the only thing missing now was that she had forgotten to close the door and someone had broken in and stolen her mother's things.

_Wouldn't that night ever end?_

Raven silently picked up the phone and dialed her godfather's number, but the call went directly to voicemail. Raven took a few steps and when she looked down the hall, Jay was signaling her to be silent.

\- "Go!" - He whispered to her.

\- "Please, Uncle Clark, answer!" - she hissed between her teeth.

\- "I swear I don't know where she is." - Rose's voice came from another room, sounding calm to someone being attacked. Raven quickly hid behind a piece of furniture the moment the message dropped into voicemail.

\- "Uncle Clark, I think someone invaded the house and are attacking Rose..." - Raven became unbalanced and crashed into the chair, causing a bag of corn to fall on the floor.

Oh no... A bag of corn?

_"Lois and Clark said they are going to bring you some corn."_

Raven swallowed and stood up timidly as she hung up the phone and tried to find a plausible excuse for the sermon she was going to take for being out at 4 am. With luck, she would be able to get around the situation.

Her eyes met the blue-violet, angry eyes of Lois Lane, who had her arms crossed looking at her goddaughter.

\- "Umm... Hi Aunt Lois..."

\- "You are grounded, young lady. Forever!"


	5. Blue boots of a Gotham cinderella

_**December 22 - 11:40 AM** _

Damian looked at his watch as he descended the stairs to the basement of the bakery, hoping to find at least a sign of life there. It was just after eleven in the morning and everything was too quiet, he hoped that John Constantine hadn't fucked up and left to go back to London's dirt with his notebook.

The floor was dirty and full of disposable cups and the smell of sweat along with the alcohol sprinkled on the floor was bad, very bad. But Damian did find signs of life there. Lying in the middle of musical instruments and using his coat as a pillow, John snored softly with his hand on his face.

At least once in his life he hadn't screwed up.

\- "Hey," - Damian whispered, tapping him on the foot - "Constantine."

\- "Mmm." - He grunted in an unintelligible way. - "Damn bastard baby bat."

\- "Hi!" - Damian smiled wryly.

\- "Come back later, I'm kind of busy."

\- “As soon as I get what I came for. Can I get the notebook? ” - John mumbled something that Damian didn't understand and turned to the other side, turning his back to Damian and going back to sleep. - "Hey. Can you give me Raven's red notebook?”

\- "Isn't with me."

\- "And where is it?"

\- "She didn't leave it here."

\- "What? Didn't she come?”

\- “She came, She did. Man, she's crazy!”

\- "That girl is awesome, man." - Gary murmured from somewhere behind the drums. - "She makes very insane little steps dancing in those blue boots."

\- "Seriously?" - Damian grimaced, trying to imagine her there dancing among all the other people. 

She had met the challenge and had fun and that was great, right? Why did he feel like something was out of place? Why was he afraid of her meeting someone different there?

\- “And then... Poof! She disappeared. Like magic..."

\- "Actually she ran like Cinderella."

\- "Well... If she came, she must have left the notebook somewhere." - Damian said looking around, wondering where she could have left the notebook and where he should start. There was that weird fear in the pit of his stomach, as if something bad was going to happen. As if the fairy tale was about to end and he was not the chosen one.

Constantine murmured something that Damian didn't bother trying to understand. He was already scanning the place, looking under old furniture and behind shelves. He even touched some substance of doubtful origin.

\- "Disgusting!" - He scowled, shaking his hand. Panic started to take hold of Damian, the notebook was nowhere to be found and he was running out of options of where to look. The only place left to look was the bathroom, but he doubted she would have hidden it in that disgusting place.

Damian blew out a frustrated breath and turned on the sink’s faucet, washing his hand while he thought of different scenarios as to why she hadn't left the notebook for him. Would she have found someone better? Had she met another guy? Had she given up on that fun little game they had created? He thought of several things, but none of it seemed like something that girl would do.

But again, he didn't know her well, so there was no way for him to know what she would or wouldn't do.

Damian ran a wet hand over his face, and then his eyes darted to the mirror, looking at the message he had left for her. Underneath what he had written, in Raven's handwriting, was a written message in lipstick.

_"But I'm scared."_

At that moment, things made sense in Damian's mind and reason fell with the weight of an anchor on his head. That was why she hadn't left the notebook, he had fucked up the whole thing, he had pushed her and she had been scared. He would never see her again all because he was such a big idiot.

Damian snorted wanting to hit himself for it as he left the bathroom, thinking about what he would do now, while John seemed to have finally woken up and was trying to get his bandmates to get up too. He looked at Damian pacing up and down with an eyebrow raised.

\- “So, baby bat...? Did you find the notebook?”

\- "That was a big mistake."

\- "What? She was having fun.”

\- “No, she was afraid. I demanded too much from her. And now, without the notebook, I can't even apologize or explain.”

\- "She was the queen!" - Greg shouted from somewhere.

\- "She really was." - John said, lighting the cigarette. - “The queen.”

\- "Doesn’t matter. It's over now and I will never know who she was! ” - Damian declared angrily to himself, leaving the stage cursing in his mother tongue as his shoes hit hard against the concrete of the stairs.

He felt almost lost, guilt weighing on his shoulders as he looked at the gray sky above him after a cold snowy night. But then he saw something blue catch his eye in a puddle of mud that was almost frozen. Damian tilted his head to the side and walked over to the puddle and saw that it was a shoe, a blue overshoes to be precise.

Damian crouched and took the boot with his fingertips, drawing the water out of it and looking at it curiously.

\- "Hey, it’s your girl's boot." - Greg's voice came from behind his back.

\- "Why did she leave the boot?"

\- “Maybe for you to find. Like a clue.”

\- "Yeah... You never heard the story of Cinderella, baby bat?" - John said, with a cigarette hanging from his mouth and his hands inside his beige coat. He smiled and walked away, leaving Damian with many doubts and a blueboot in his hands. He looked for something, an address or a tip, but all he found was “TDF” written on the inside of the boot in black pen.

There was only one person who could help him with that and that person was Maps.

\- "What does 'TDF' mean?" - He said, placing the boot on the counter and almost making her fall from the swivel chair she was sitting on.

\- "What?"

\- "TDF... What does TDF mean?" - He said with his hands in his pocket. - "The clue girl, Raven... She left the party yesterday and didn't leave the notebook, just this boot and the only thing I found inside the boot was this acronym."

\- "Oh..." - Maps smiled. - "A Cinderella tale! This is so cute! Okay...I have no idea what this could mean."

\- "But ... You have to know. Someone has to know what this means!"

\- “Let's think about it, calm down. You don't have to stress.” - She clapped her hands before reaching for a pen and notepad.

\- “I'll call Gotham Bookshop. Perhaps the girl at the information desk can help find this girl.”

\- “So, what can this be? It’s nothing like Raven so what can it be? Okay ... TDF ... Tilly Don Feinstein.” - He shook his head to Maps that it was a no, while dialing the Gotham Bookstore number.

\- "Hi, I would like to talk to Tara..." - Damian said, his brow furrowed, clearly annoyed. - "I don't know, she works at the information desk and has blonde hair." - He took a deep breath - “I don't know. She is rude and condescending. What? So I think you should hire different people... Hello? Hello? Shit!" - Damian took the phone from his ear and threw it on the counter, resting his head in his hands. - "This is impossible!"

\- "Look, I'm making a list of possible people who have these acronyms and can help us find Raven, okay?" - She crossed out the first name, waiting for Damian to look at her. - “Taylor DeFranco? Tamatha Denise Feeny? Aunt Destiny Falkner?”

\- "These people don't even exist."

\- "Tour de France."

\- "Stop." - He looked at her, looking like he hadn't slept in days. - "Are you sure she left nothing here?"

\- “I checked everything, looked at every inch of this store and so did you. Nothing."

\- "This is stupid, I will never find her again!"

\- “Hey, Dami. Don’t give up! If the prince had given up on finding Cinderella, she would never have become a queen.” - She patted his hair and then looked at the phone lying on the counter. Only Maps had the freedom to tap his hair and take his phone without having her hands cut off - “Give me your phone. I have an idea."

\- "What idea?"

\- “I'm downloading a mommy app. It's like middle age gossip girls.”

\- "No. Not that app, no way.”

\- “Trust me, they will find the girl! Those women are detectives. They know everything!” - She smiled and took the boot, taking some pictures of the object in her hand. - “I'll send some pictures and activate the notifications. You're welcome." - She giggled, handing the phone to him.

\- "No. Using the internet is against the rules of the game.”

\- "Dami, if she didn't leave the notebook, she might have given up." - She raised her eyebrow, but that didn't help Damian's spirits, he now felt worse than before. - “Not that I know what she would do... or how she is. Because I don't know her or I never spoke to her, obviously.”

Damian snorted while looking at the phone stretched out towards him. Seriously considering whether or not he should break the rules this time just to be able to finally meet this mysterious girl until he finally gave up and picked up the phone, letting out his breath.

\- “Ah, screw it. But I'm just going to look for TDF.” - Maps laughed, nodding ironically as Damian typed quickly, his green eyes searching for any sign that made sense. - “So... We have a Theater Development Fund. One of Gotham City's oldest costume rental shops. It is in the Financial District.”

\- "Okay... Come on." - Maps beamed, getting up and picking up her coat.

\- "Aren't you on your work schedule?"

\- "Damian... Nobody comes to movie stores during the Christmas season." - She smiled sideways, jumping off the counter and going to his side. Damian smiled back, glad to have a friend like Maps on his side, willing to accept the crazy things he was doing. - "Let’s go?" - He sighed defeated and nodded. - "Operation Cinderella started! And you pay for the taxi.”

The only reason the trip to practically the other side of Gotham was not a complete show of anxiety, was because Maps was never silent at any time. But Damian's head was barely able to focus on what Maps was talking about, he was hyper focused trying to find a reason for it all. 

One reason she hadn't left the notebook for him as they had agreed.

The store was an old shed, almost on the outskirts of Gotham, and smelled like old clothes. There were unconventional clothes everywhere, coming from sets of plays from all over Gotham and possibly Metropolis. People walked up and down carrying washed clothes and bringing back dirty ones. Damian tried to get someone willing to talk to him about the boot, eventually a tired looking middle aged woman decided to help him. After leaving Maps and Damian waiting for a considerable 30 minutes, she returned with a file folder in hand.

\- "According to our records, the boot was used in the original production of The Music Man, in 1958."

\- "How does that help?"

\- "Then a few years ago it was loaned to a Metropolis college, a school for performing arts, and never it came back."

\- "Okay, that helps..."

\- “And it says here that someone paid for the lost boots. One Elizabeth Bennet.”

\- "I'm sure it's her!" - Damian said, feeling he was finally getting somewhere. Only a girl who hid clues in a bookstore would use a pseudonym and still pay for wellies borrowed from a thrift store.

\- "That name is false, of course, but the money was not."

\- "Do you have the return address there?"

\- "Hmm..." - She looked in the files, and then looked at Damian. - "Wait a minute. I thought you wanted to return the boot to the original owner.”

\- "Yes, that’s what we want."

\- "We are the original owners!"

\- "No, you are not."

\- "My lovely lady." - Maps said politely, - "Our friend paid for these boots, she is the owner."

\- "Great, I'll give it back to her!"

\- "No!" - Damian almost shouted, imposing himself in front of the woman who had taken the boot from his hands. - "I have to return this to her."

\- “Anyway, I have to wash a lot of dirty pantaloons from the Spamalot tour. Have a nice day, Mr. Wayne. ” - She snorted and dodged him, continuing to walk down the hall with the boot under her arms only to have the path blocked by Damian again.

\- "No" - He took her shoulders and closed his eyes. - "It's not just about the boots."

\- "It is not?"

\- "No. I... ”- He took a deep breath and looked around, trying to find something that could help him, then he saw that she wore a Phantom of the Opera shirt. - “You don't know me, okay? But I am like the Phantom.”

\- "His name is Erik."

\- "Yes, exactly, Erik." - He smiled falsely. Maps looked at him attentively, with a raised eyebrow - "And, like Erik, I..." - It was difficult for him to assume things even if falsely. Even though deep down, he knew he wasn’t speaking so falsely. - “I also wear a mask. Not literally, but I don't let people know me. But this girl, a girl I only met through her own words... She understands me. And, last night, she was supposed to leave a message for me in a nightclub, but she just left that boot.”

\- "Like Cinderella."

\- "Yes. I can't lose her. I cannot lose the only girl who understands me in this city, and I am willing to pay as much as you want for this boot if necessary. I'm not a lunatic, I'm just a guy with a boot asking you to help me find... My cinderella.” - Damian was not good at this, but it seemed part of what he said actually touched the woman. She looked at Damian and then her eyes filled with tears. Maps was still looking at Damian with a raised eyebrow and trying to understand what had just happened.

\- “Well, I don't want to be the evil stepmother. I don't want to get in the way of true love.” - She smiled through tears and handed the boot to Damian again, along with the envelope with the address of who had paid for the boots. - "Good luck, young prince!"

\- "Thanks!" - Damian smiled, genuinely this time, holding the envelope with the address and the boot against his chest. After a few seconds the woman walked away, wiping tears of emotion and leaving Maps and Damian alone.

Maps looked at Damian for a long second and then put her hand on Damian's shoulder, forcing him to look at her.

\- "What you said about the girl..." - She frowned, - "Are you serious, Damian? Did you really mean it, all that talk about love?”

Damian raised an eyebrow, looking at Maps. He could not admit that, or that friend of his with short hair and cheeks full of freckles and the heart of an 11 year old girl, was not going to keep him alive.

He still hadn't admitted to himself that he might be liking this girl romantically.

\- "No, it was just for her to give me the address." - Damian said, trying to lie to himself in the process. Maps looked at him silently and then nodded.

\- “Okay, you got the address. And what are you going to do now?”

\- "Let's go there."

\- "To the address?"

\- "Yes..."

\- "So come on, prince charming!" - She laughed, feeling excited while hopping and patting Damian on the shoulder. He looked at the envelope and his smile grew, the address was not far from the penthouse, nor far from Gotham Bookstore. It made perfect sense now.

\- "Let's meet Raven."

The fact of practically crossing Gotham three times that day, following clues about Raven, ended up messing with Damian and making him more anxious than he was in the past 5 days. He was finally going to meet the girl he had corresponded with all that time, and he couldn't help being nervous and anxious. His hands didn't stop going from his coat pocket to his leg and then going back to his coat again.

What would she look like? How would she react?

He held the boot, looking at the blue plastic and thinking about what had happened, and how beautiful she must have looked in those shoes. How she would have done her hair or if she still had a natural lavender scent even with all her makeup on. Had she tried to find him? Those questions would die with him if he didn't find her again, but at that point, Damian didn't care much about it anymore, he just wanted to know if she was okay and apologize for making her push her limits the night before. Because he didn't think about what it would do to her before proposing her to go to a punk show. She had a social phobia and he forced her.

He was an idiot.

_**December 22 - 2:54 pm** _

Raven looked at the notebook resting on the dresser in her room. That night had been perfect and disastrous in equal amounts, and the fact that the notebook was there was proof of that.

And it was proof that this was all a mistake.

She would never be the girl that boy expected her to be, she wasn't as brave and strong as he thought she was. In fact, she was fearful, weak, and stupid. What girl in that city would run away just because a guy who bullied her when they were younger said she was a freak?  
Gar was an idiot and she should keep that in mind and tell him that, but all she managed to do was run and cry like the scared little girl she was, that she always was.

She needed to put an end to this before that incredible and mysterious boy created more ideas around who she was supposed to be. And she had to put an end to it now.  
Raven got up and took the notebook in her hands, letting out a heavy breath as she sat down and picked up a pen. She wanted to thank him for the incredible moments they shared, but put a stop to that way of thinking before one of them got hurt, and from what she could see now, she knew it was she who would get hurt.

But how would she get it back to him? Lois was like a guard dog at the apartment door, she would never let her go out to take the notebook to the store where Maps worked but... Rose wasn’t grounded.

Come to think of it, Rose had spent the morning in the guest room with the door closed.

Raven quickly scribbled on the sheet what she wanted to say to the boy in the notebook, and then crawled toward Rose's room, knocking three times before opening the door and finding Rose with her eyes closed and looking sick.

\- "Can you stop pretending you're sick?" - Raven said. closing the door right behind her. - "It's just me, Raven"

\- “I'm not pretending. I'm sick,” - Rose mumbled, her hand on her forehead and her voice nasally, as Raven sat on the bed next to her. - “Why did I think it would be romantic to sleep on the roof in winter? In the middle of December?”

\- "Why didn't you tell me that Lois is back?"

\- "Don’t yell at me. My heart and head hurts."

\- "Your heart? What...?" - Raven said, looking puzzled, and then she looked around and noticed that something was missing there: Jay - "Where's Jay?"

\- " His name is Jason Todd… And she banished him from here." - Rose said, sinking between the pillows. - “I could only spend Christmas with you if he left. Can you believe that Lois knows him? He's a fucking Wayne! I was fucking with a Wayne and I didn't even know it!”

\- "A Wayne?"

\- "Yeah... This now kind of makes sense, because he has a fucking bar in a fucking upscale area of Gotham, like Neville." - Rose grumbled. - "I had to make a difficult choice between fulfilling my promise that I made your mother to take care of you for Christmas, or spending a Christmas night having sex so good that I would see Santa Claus himself with his reindeer." - She paused to sneeze, and then threw herself on the bed afterwards. - "But of course this cold helped the decision."

\- "You were going to leave me alone because of a night of sex?" - Raven scrunched her face trying not to laugh.

\- "You wouldn't be alone... Besides, your mother would understand." - She gave a smile that Raven knew was more of a joke. - "Let me guess: Lois found out about your weird boyfriend?"

\- "First, he is not my boyfriend"

\- "He kind of is... You just haven't kissed yet but ..."

\- “No, he is not my boyfriend. We had a fun game and I happened to be interested in it.”

\- "If you say so..."

\- “And second, I had to tell her. She wanted to know what I was doing on the street at 4 a.m., and I had to explain that I needed to deliver something to someone I had met.”

\- "Trust me, she still took it easy on you."

\- "Well, it doesn't matter anyway ... I'm grounded forever and I need your help." - Raven licked her lower lip before showing Rose the notebook. - “I kind of forgot to leave the notebook there at the show and Lois won't let me out. Take it to Blockbuster for me? It's only 15 minutes if you run.”

\- "Run? I'm sick!"

\- “There is a girl there, called Maps. She will know what to do. Please, Rose!”

\- "I have a fever."

\- "You don't have a fever." - Raven put her hand on Rose's forehead and noticed how hot she was. - "My God you are burning up!"

\- "I told you." - She said defeated, her tousled silver hair falling in her face. She ran a hand over her forehead, pulling the messy strands out of her face and then looked at Raven a little confused - “Wait. How could you forget? Wasn't that the goal?”

\- “The goal was for me to face my fears and oppressions, but one of them showed up, that asshole Garfield Logan. Fucking my life since the days of elementary school. He’s that same bad kid, only in the body of a 17-year-old guy.”

\- "And is he hot?" - Raven gave Rose a flat stare and then rolled her eyes.

\- “I knew it was a mistake to go. I thought about all the bad things that could happen and it ended up being worse. Then I ran away.”

\- "Like...?" - Rose motioned as if she were running with her fingers. - "In the literal sense of _'running away'_?"

\- "Yes. But with falling on the ice and crying.” - Raven looked at her own hands, holding the notebook. - "Please take this for me." - Rose rolled her eyes and took the notebook, opening it on the page that Raven had marked. Raven tried to take the notebook back to prevent Rose from reading it, but before she reached it, Rose dodged Raven's hands and sat down.

\- "Hey!"

\- _"It was fun, but it's a troubled time for me."_ \- Rose read aloud, then grimaced looking at Raven. - "Are you giving up?"

\- “It better I do it now. This way, I leave with my dignity and he still thinks I'm cool.”

\- "Nope. I will not participate in this.” - Rose threw the notebook to Raven again and pulled the covers over her head.

\- "Ah, what is it?"

\- "If you want to give up so much, find a way to go yourself." - She mumbled from under the cover.

Raven took a deep breath, looking at the notebook lying on her lap. She had hoped that Rose could do this for her, but now, Rose didn't seem to want to change her mind about it.

\- "Okay... I will bring some ibuprofen for you."

\- "And licorice tea with lots of honey, please."

\- "Okay." - She made a face and stood up, leaving the room with the notebook in hand. At least that could be an excuse for her to step out of the mint-colored walls of the apartment she lived in.

Raven walked down the hall while looking at the notebook, thinking about how she would tell Maps to deliver it to the boy and tell her about what had happened. Then she started thinking about how she would convince Lois to let her out when the doorbell rang.

\- "What are you doing near the door, young lady?" - Lois said, appearing under the entryway.

\- "I was just thinking of going to buy medicine for Rose... She has a cold. And then the doorbell rang." - She pointed to the door.

\- "Then open the door!" - Raven raised an eyebrow. - “But get out of the doorway, you're still grounded, young lady.

\- "Okay... But what about Rose's medicine?"

\- "I can go shopping, you're still grounded, I said."

\- "Damn it."

\- "Language, young lady"

\- "Sorry Aunt Lois." - Raven said, rolling her eyes and opening the door. She had the feeling that all her hopes were going away. And her plan to at least keep things cool between her and the mysterious boy were going down the drain, then her gaze found who was standing on the other side of the door, smiling at her.

\- "You?" - Lois Lane's voice said behind Raven.

\- "Hello dear!"

_**December 22 - 12:00 AM** _

When Damian got out of the taxi, his heart was racing and his hands were shaking like a bamboo shoot in the wind. Was he finally going to meet her, or was it one more piece in the game they had been playing all this time?

He was restless, nervous, anxious to know if he would finally see what she looked like and could finally apologize for forcing her to exceed her limits. Maps was beside him, staring at him as if she expected him to finally take action.

Suddenly, the stairs seemed like way too many to go up to the small entrance decorated with a green and red garland.

\- "I think you should talk to her first." - Damian said looking at Maps.

\- "Me? Why? I don't even know her. Why would I speak before you? Doesn’t make sense."

\- “Look, maybe she doesn't even want to see me. Tell her I'm sorry. You can be my Cyrano. You can do it?" - Maps looked at him for a few seconds and then sighed in defeat

\- "If you're asking..." - She held the boot in her hand and started up the stairs, before being interrupted by Damian again - "What?"

\- "Wait! I have to leave first.”

\- "Then go."

\- "Okay ..." - Damian said, turning around and taking two steps before turning back to Maps again. - "No. I have to do this, and you have to go. This is the moment for Damian and Raven. As it has always been since that game started.” - Maps smiled and handed the boot to him again.

He was falling for this girl he didn't even know, and Maps was happy about that... Raven was a nice girl.

\- "Then ring the bell." - She patted him on the shoulder. - "Good luck, man."

\- "Thanks!"

\- "Call me later." - She said, walking to the taxi, and leaving Damian there with a boot in his hand as he walked up the steps. He watched Maps wave at him as the taxi followed the avenue until it disappeared at the next corner.

He took a deep breath and stepped on the bottom step, rocking on his heels before finally deciding to knock on the door. It took about 5 minutes for the door to open and an elegant woman with black hair and blue eyes appeared in front of him. She was beautiful, but she wasn’t a teenager. She looked at Damian waiting for him to answer what he was doing there, and then she looked at the boot in his hand.

\- "You found my boot!" - Damian was shocked for a few seconds before cocking his head to the side in confusion.

\- "Your boot...?"

\- "Yes, sir."

\- "Were you at a punk show yesterday?"

\- “Oh, no. That is something that John would do, not me.”

\- "Okay, are you writing to someone in a red notebook?"

\- "Ah!" - She smiled. - “Now I understand why you're here. Come in... ”- She smiled, opening the door so he could enter. Damian began to think that his correspondent was not who he really thought she was. That woman wasn’t the teenage girl he initially thought of.

\- "Okay."

In fact, he knew her. She was a woman famous for her magic shows.

_Zatanna Zatara._

Damian entered the house trying to understand what was going on. She was definitely not Raven, there was no way she was writing to a teenager in a red notebook at Gotham Bookshop.

\- "Coffee?"

\- "Always." - Damian replied in a catatonic state, trying to connect the dots. He needed something to drink, something strong. But he doubted that she was going to give him a glass of whiskey.

It was a luxurious house. With fine furniture and sophisticated decor, lit by a chandelier in the large living room and with elevator music playing very softly in the background on the suspended speakers.

\- "Wow." - Damian said, looking around. - "Do you live here alone?"

\- "I rarely live here, dear, and I am rarely alone." - She gave a warm smile, while pouring him a cup of coffee. - "My cousin Zachary and John Constantine are almost always around." Damian nodded slowly while still looking at the decor.

She motioned for Damian to sit in the chair while she sat in the opposite chair facing him, and suddenly Damian felt assessed.

Well this was awful. His feet wouldn’t stop fidgeting from nervousness.

\- “Let me calm you down. I am not the girl you are looking for.” - She smiled again, pouring the cup for him. Damian couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief.

\- "Okay, so Raven is here?"

\- "Who are you?"

\- "Well, I'm Damian Wayne."

\- “Oh... Bruce's son. Gods I get lost on how many kids Bruce has in total. He always shows up with a new child every time I see him.” - She chuckled - "Okay and how did you meet Raven?"

\- "She and I talked through a little red notebook."

\- “That I advised her to use as something to vent the feelings she had pent up, when I gave her my blue booties. She was just over 13 years old. She was pretty reclusive, never had friends and I saw from a distance how much it could harm her.” - She smiled with a bit of sadness. - “You're looking for the daughter of a friend, and my protégé, Raven. Not for me."

\- "You are Elizabeth Bennet."

\- "Yes..." - She affirmed. - "Raven has always been fascinated by books. Since I have known her, she has devoured them as if they were the food of her soul that she needed to not starve. But she always fell in love with Jane Austen, so she gave me the nickname Bennet because of the book. She said it was more sophisticated and romantic than _‘Zatanna Zatara’_.

\- "As the main character of Pride and Prejudice." - Damian said, nodding.

\- "Exactly..." - She smiled.

\- "So... Can I talk to her?"

\- "Are you in love with her?"

\- "What?" - Damian’s eyes widened. - "No, I don't even know her."

\- “Well, then I'm not interested. Be well."- Zatanna said, getting up again. -" Thank you for bringing the boot, I'll return it when I can."

\- "Wait, what?"

\- "I don't know if you are the right person for my Raven." - She raised her eyebrows. - "Do you believe in fairies?"

\- "No."

\- "In the power of desires?"

\- "No."

\- "In love at first sight?"

\- "Umm..."

\- "In magic?"

\- "Wait, this makes no sense." - He shook his head. - "Look, Zatanna, I'm not the type of guy who believes in things."

\- "You believed you could find a girl with just a boot."

\- "Can you just tell me where she is?"

\- “Her family will never let you see her. Her entire family protects her as if she were a jewel. They don't even let me see her! All because of a show in Vegas!”

\- "Could you at least deliver a message for me? Could you try, please?"

\- “And why would I try? Opening an old wound back to a place where I'm not welcome, to deliver a message from someone that maybe Raven doesn't even want to know.”

\- "Look, last night I made her do something that scared her, and I haven't heard from her since."

\- "What did you make her do?"

\- "I told her to have fun at a punk show by John Constantine's band." - He rested his hand on his forehead. - “It was stupid, I know, but... I wanted her to have fun. But she got scared, and I haven’t been able to find out how she's been since then. I don't know if she got hurt, if something happened, I just want to know if she's okay.”

\- "Why?"

\- "Because...? Because I... ”- Damian swallowed, thinking about what he would say. Why did he care so much for a girl he didn't know? Why did he want to make sure she was okay? Why did he play this game in the first place, and why did he feel so concerned that he might never speak to her again? - “Because I care about her. More than I thought I could care.” - Damian said with a sigh, seeming to lift a weight from his back. Zatanna broke into a satisfied smile, seeming to have received the answer she needed.

\- "This is way better." - She smiled - “I'll help you, Damian. But keep the boot. It is not the fairy who takes the shoe to Cinderella. It's the prince.”

_**December 22 - 3:00 pm** _

\- "Hello dear!"

\- "You?" Lois Lane's voice came from behind Raven when she saw Zatanna Zatara standing at the door, wearing a fur coat with a big smile on her lips. Things between Zatanna and Lois weren't the best since they competed for Raven's attention.

Lois won, but Angela always let Zatanna be like the girl's second godmother. Always giving advice and gifts, and taking care of her when she was in Gotham and not at one of her millionaire magic shows.

That is until Zatanna took Raven, Conner, and Zachary to Las Vegas and completely forgot to warn Lois and Angela.

\- "Z!" - Raven said, running to hug the witch. - “Aunt Lois, can I talk to Z? Please!!" - Raven said pleadingly and Lois blew out a heavy breath.

\- “Just while I'm gone to get some pills for Rose. Okay?" - She put the bag on her shoulder and left, passing Z without looking at the magician. - "I will not take too long."  
As soon as Lois left with her nose up and slamming the door a little harder than necessary, Raven and Zatanna sat on the dining table chairs.

\- "Do you want tea? Coffee? Water?"

\- "I think water is good, dear." - She indicated, and Raven got up running to get a glass of water in the kitchen for Zatanna. - “So, where is your mother? And have you been practicing your magic tricks?”

\- “Mom traveled to San Francisco for her Christmas. She said she was going to be able to take her first vacation since I was born, and I didn't want to disturb that.” - Raven shrugged. - “And magic tricks are so difficult! I will never be able to learn them.”

\- "So your mother preferred to leave you with the tyrant Lois Lane than with me?"

\- “No, Lois arrived yesterday from Smallville. Rose and her boyfriend have been here with me.” - Raven sat down again facing Zatanna. - "But it's okay, my Christmas was already doomed to failure."

\- "How are you my sweetheart?"

\- "To be honest, not very well."

\- "That's because you only have one boot." - Raven made a face, tilting her head to the side.

\- "How do you know?"

\- "A boy tracked me down."

\- "The notebook boy?" - Raven almost couldn't control the smile growing on her lips. Had he been trying to find her? Did he actually care about her?

\- “He did an impressive job as a detective. Without a doubt, he cares a lot.”

\- “It's because he didn't see me. I was a disaster. It was embarrassing.”

\- "He is concerned."

\- “He is worried about the strong, fearless, and cool girl in his head, that yesterday I proved is not me. I tried to be, but I blew it. If he knew, he wouldn't be looking for me.”

\- "Well, if you have any questions, you can ask him." - Zatanna smiled, holding Raven's hand. - “I asked him to keep the boot just in case. After all, it is the prince who returns the shoe, not the fairy godmother.”

\- "I can’t." - Raven said, discouraged. - "Even if I wanted to talk to him…”

\- "She's grounded." - Lois Lane appeared again, with a bag in her hands. Gods was she some kind of speedster? It had taken her not even 15 minutes to get medicine.

\- "That is what I call speed."

\- "There is a pharmacy on the second corner." - Lois said, placing a hand on Raven's shoulders. - "Thanks for the visit, Z. But now it's time for you to go."

\- "Why is Raven grounded?"

\- "You gave up your right to give your opinion when you were irresponsible, Zatanna."

\- "Doing a show in Las Vegas and taking the kids with me to have fun is not being irresponsible, Lois Lane."

\- “You are irresponsible, a bad influence. You and John Constantine.”

\- "Just because I took Raven to a show outside Metropolis?"

\- "You took her to Las Vegas!"

\- "That is not in Metropolis."

\- “Please go away. You know that her mom doesn't want you to have contact and I am responsible for her.”

\- "I am just as much a godmother to Raven as you are and I will have my word." - She pulled Raven into her embrace, and again, as always, Raven felt like a tug of war rope. Lois didn't want to give in, but she knew that Zatanna would only leave if she said what she had to say, and honestly, Lois had a lot to think about since she returned from Smallville.

\- "Okay." - Lois said, huffing - "You," - She pointed to Raven, - "Wait in your room."

\- "But Aunt Lois-"

\- "Don’t worry." - Zatanna said, smiling. - “Obey your godmother as the good girl you are and go to your room. When we resolve things, you will be the first to know.”

Raven tried to protest but it was useless. Again, everyone was treating her like the helpless little princess she was not. She snorted and turned away, leaving for her room and too irritated to argue.

It was her life they were talking about, not where to go to dinner that night. Raven was no longer 5, she was 17, and more responsible than those two women together!

After staying in the room for a while, Raven could no longer look at the lilac walls with lavender flowers drawn on them. She would go crazy! So she decided to spy on the two women through the glass in the living room door.

\- "At least you went to a club once in your life." - Rose said, from behind her. - "Before it’s... Over forever. Because they will never let you leave the house again.”

Raven looked at Rose, reflecting on what she said, and then looked at the two women on the other side of the glass talking about her life, deciding what to do with her. She couldn't allow that! She was not a delicate flower that people had to protect in order not to break.

\- "Enough." - Raven said, getting up and taking the reins of the situation. She walked purposefully through the living room door, attracting their attention. - "Enough! My life is my own, and I... ”- All of Raven's impetuosity died the moment she arrived in the room and found Lois sighing with silver drops rolling down her cheek. - "What did you say to her, Zatanna?"

\- "You and your godmother need to talk."

\- “Aunt Lois? I’m sorry. I will never leave the house again.”

\- "Raven." - Zatanna said, smiling lovingly. - "The problem is not with you." - She got up, picking up her coat and bag. - "I hope to see you soon at one of my shows."

\- "Are you going home?" - Raven said when Zatanna passed her, walking towards the exit door.

\- "You can handle it."

\- "No, I can’t! She's crying! I am not good with emotions.”

\- "Defend your limitations and show that they are yours, my dear."

\- "What does that mean?"

\- "You will find out." - And even with Raven's protests, Zatanna left, leaving a monstrous silence between Raven and Lois, who looked at the window and the gray Gotham skyline.

\- "What happened, Aunt Lois?" - Lois was silent for a few seconds before looking at Raven again. The blue-violet eyes seemed to announce a storm before softening.

\- “Me and your uncle Clark fought. That's why I'm here.”

\- "I'm sorry... You two always looked so happy."

\- "And we are..." - Lois said with a weak smile.

\- "Then why?"

\- “He wants to go back to the Kent farm. Ma Kent can no longer manage the farm alone, and Clark thinks it is a good time to return.”

\- "Ah, you don't say..."

\- "What?"

\- "Uncle Clark was never a big fan of Metropolis... It’s not news that he would return to Smallville one day" - Raven said, as if it were something obvious. - "Of course, he loves the life he has there and his job at Daily Planet, but his heart has always been in Smallville.”

\- “I live in Metrópolis. My family lives in Metropolis. My job is in Metropolis. You are a bridge away from Metropolis.”

\- "I know. And apparently, I always will be.” - She smiled. - "You love Uncle Clark, right?"

\- "Of course I love him." - She finally smiled. - “He taught me that I don't need to be lonely. I thought I didn't need to have someone if I had a dream job on the Daily Planet.”

\- "I know how it is." - Raven murmured, unable to contain a smile on her face. - "It's okay." - Raven looked away and sighed. - "Do you like Smallville?"

\- "It’s nice." - Lois tilted his head to the side, reflecting. - “It's cool, Jon would have room to grow, and God knows how that boy needs space. He loves to stay there, it is always a struggle to get him back to Metropolis.”

\- “I think you should talk. Try to make it right.” - Raven said, firmly. - “There are worse things than facing 425 miles between Smallville and Metropolis a few times a week to deliver an article for the Daily Planet. It’s not like you’re moving to the other side of the country.” - Lois smiled the way she did before, lovingly, and Raven felt as if she had taken out a thorn that had been bothering.

\- "I'll think about it."

\- "From what I know of Uncle Clark, he must already be packing to come after you."

\- "He deserves to be silent for a day." - She said, trying to maintain the serious pose, before giving a relieved laugh. - "When did I start taking advice from a 17 year old girl?"

\- "Well... it wasn't all bad." - Raven shrugged.

\- "I come to Gotham not to be alone at Christmas in Metropolis, and I find Jason Todd naked in Rose's bed, and you spent the night out." - Lois said, not looking at Raven - "Your mother trusts me as your godmother, I don't want you to be in trouble."

\- "I know I-"

\- "But I was too strict." - She finally said. - “I can't forbid you to go out to the streets, and your mother would hate me if I did that. I overreacted." - She took a deep breath. - “You’re still grounded for today, but not forever. And I’ll let your mother know what you've been up to, talking to a stranger? Spending the night away from home? Oh yes, she definitely needs to know that.”

\- "Really? I’m not grounded?”

\- "No..." - Lois affirmed. - "And so, I think we should have an ice cream." - Raven saw the smile on her face widen and just as her smile widened, she saw that this could be the opportunity she needed to take the notebook to Maps. But how do you convince Lois to stop by a video store?

The cafeteria.

Raven opened the notebook and reread the message she had written. No, she shouldn't give up, not when he didn't give up on going after her to know how she was doing. Not when he made her feel less lonely, even if it was just with the crazy challenges they had done together in the past 5 days.

It would be unfair to give up on something when he didn't give up on it.

\- “Actually, do you know what I'm in the mood for? There is a cafeteria not far from here, 15 minutes away. I think it's a great idea to go for tea and cookies.” - She grinned, and Lois was surprised, but then nodded yes. - "Great, I'll change!"

\- “Warn Rose. She is not feeling well but... ”

\- "Okay, I'm going!" - Raven ran to the room faster than lightning, almost bumping into things as she pulled out the notebook and a pen to write to the boy. If she managed to convince Lois to go to the store, she would be able to ask Maps to hand him the notebook that day.

The game would be saved.

They sat in the chairs outside the cafeteria, watching the movement on the gray street and all the moody people passing by. Lois always had a pencil in her hair and a notebook in her purse. She said that the news didn’t wait for you to be ready so she was always prepared, and when Lois saw there was a way to write another column on Gotham’s public policies, Raven took advantage to put her plan into action.

\- "I'm going to order our tea."

\- “Oh no dear, for me it's coffee. Black.”- She said, without looking up from the book.

\- "Okay... Hmmm... Aunt Lois... I need to borrow a movie, and it is right here next to the cafeteria, can I go there while we wait for our order?" - Lois looked up from her notes, one eyebrow raised as if he suspected Raven. - "I swear it won't take more than 10 minutes, you can time it." - The silence lasted for a few more minutes before Lois snorted and then nodded.

\- "Okay, okay..." - She rolled her eyes. - "10 minutes."

\- "Thanks!" - She said, smiling and jumping up and running towards the door, almost forgetting to place orders.

Raven entered the video store, almost making the bell that warned the entrance of a new customer fall off, and Maps jumped out of her chair almost instantly. She seemed to be dozing, but she broke into a huge smile when she saw Raven there.

\- "Oh wow... My god it’s you!"

\- "Yes. Look, I need to be quick.”

\- "We looked for you everywhere!"

\- "I know. My bad. I was terrified, I ran away and... ”

\- "It’s okay... The important thing is that he found you, right?"

\- "It was a friend of the family ..." - Raven smiled, and took the notebook out of her bag. - "Well... Do you deliver?"

\- "Mmm..." - She looked at the notebook. - "Well, I'm in the middle of my day..."

\- "It’s urgent." - Raven winked at her. - “It needs to be delivered before 5:00 p.m. Can you do it?" - Maps took the notebook with his fingertips, and then looked at Raven and the clock at 4:15 p.m. - “Look, I left you my number outside the notebook.” - Raven showed Maps a piece of paper with a sequence of numbers. - “So when he returns the notebook, you can tell me and I can come and get it."

She would have to run to the penthouse, fly if possible.

\- "You owe me one ... Both of you do!" - She said, pointing to Raven while she put the paper with the number in her pocket and ran out the door. Holding her coat in one hand and the notebook in the other. Another boy came out of the back of the store, looking at where Maps had left, confused.

\- "Hey, where is she going?" - Raven smiled, feeling her heart beat fast again. - "She'll be back, won't she?"

\- "Yeah... I hope she always comes back."

_**December 22 - 4:30pm** _

The conversation with Zatanna made Damian think about what he really felt for that girl, and wondering what it would be like to spend the rest of the days without knowing about her. The boot was resting beside him, reminding him that he could finally find her, or he could just let it go. Forgetting that he once knew anything about her at all.

He couldn't leave it behind, he wanted to meet her.

He just hoped that Zatanna would be able to talk to her.

Damian was sunk in his thoughts, looking at the boot in his hands, when the sound indicating that the penthouse elevator opened, making him jump out of place.

\- “Five o'clock.” - She said huffing, leaning against the wall while trying to get air. Damian looked at her hand and his heart skipped a beat. There was the red notebook, glowing and bringing hope back to him. She hadn't given up. - “Five. Take the Q train. Go to Neville.”

\- "Where did you find this?"

\- "It was on the shelf today." - Maps lied. - “You need to leave it at the video store when you are finished.

\- "Wait..."

\- “Go Damian! Come on! You... You need to be there...” - She started pushing Damian into the elevator. He couldn't even get his coat, flipping through the notebook with shaking hands. - “Come on, you have to go now! You are late."

\- "Okay... Okay I'm already going..." - Why was that elevator taking so long to go down?

Damian almost got in front of the first taxi that appeared, thanking Maps a million times when the car started moving, leaving her standing and smiling at the door of the building. He was so nervous he didn't even think to ask if she wanted a ride, but she didn't seem to care anyway.

Damian ran out of the car, running down the subway stairs by jumping 3 steps and almost sliding into the train car. He had 15 minutes, and he needed to get to the address in time. He couldn't help but smile, even with the car full, even with the smell of alcohol and rot that Gotham Tube had, even with all the shit around him.

He couldn't stop smiling while holding the notebook in his hands.

The loudspeaker announced the stop where Damian was supposed to disembark, and he left looking for where he was supposed to go, walking through streets full of cars and people smiling. These people looked happy, and not in a forced way as he always thought.

Genuinely happy.

The address she sent him to was a mansion, and Damian thought for sure he would know who the owners were. It was decorated for Christmas, a bright decoration covered the entirety of the huge garden and the gates were open for visitation. Damian looked around, trying to look for someone who could be the girl, but found nothing but plastic things and Christmas lights.

Lots of Christmas lights.

He looked at the clock, he got there with 10 minutes left until 5:00 p.m. He wasn’t late.

_“I’m sorry for messing up our game. When I first got to that club, I was so worried about what people would think about me, that I could only see the bad stuff. I don't do well with bad things or bad feelings. I keep repeating to myself: If it rains, look for the rainbow. But I couldn't find one, so I ran away. Then I saw your message. Seeing that you knew how I felt made it okay to go back outside. And this time, I saw the good part. People having fun. I could join them, or stay in my shell. I joined them and discovered a whole new world. I want to do the same for you. Go to Neville and start at the Nutcracker house. You will know when you have arrived. Are you already here?”_ \- Damian felt happy, looking at the decoration again with a stupid smile on his face.

\- "I'm here, Raven."

_"Write down what you're seeing."_ \- Damian took his pen out of his pocket and sat on the lawn, writing what he saw in all that too loud decoration. There were plastic nutcracker soldiers, a fake Santa Claus and nothing real. - _“Now, look again. Give it one more chance.”_ \- Damian looked again, trying to see with his eyes what Raven would see. There, taking a photo kissing, there was an elderly couple, they must have been over 75 years old and they seemed genuinely in love and happy.

The happiness that Damian didn't believe in before was now having reality completely changed in front of him. That couple was not confusing the Christmas spirit with love, they were loving each other with the Christmas spirit. He continued walking down the street, seeing more decorated houses, with lights from the top of trees and on the walls.

_“I convinced myself that I didn't fit anywhere and I was hoping that one day everything would change. But here's a curiosity: the word ‘abracadabra’ has one of the possible sources of the Aramaic phrase ‘avra kadabra’ which means ‘I create while I speak’. We create our own magic. This notebook is magical, and we see what we are looking for. I hope you keep looking for good things. But to help you, be at the last house on the court when it is five o'clock. I'll send you a signal.”_

Damian stopped in front of the last house, looking at the children playing among the lighted bushes. The house's garden was also open for visitation and people were having fun there. It was 5:00 p.m. as she had instructed, and at that same moment a light plate came on.

_"Believe."_

Raven was helping Damian to see a side of Gotham that he didn't know. Underneath all that was gray and lifeless, and all those moody people, and all the shit about Gotham, there was a little light at this time of year. And laughter from children, and people who had spent their lives together long enough to know each other like no one else.

_“I believe in you, notebook boy. Do you still believe in me?_

She was helping Damian to meet a Gotham he didn't even know could exist, and at the same time, she was helping him to discover himself. To find the Christmas spirit he had lost in the last year and a half.

At that moment, a snowflake began to fall from the sky, and then another, and another. And gradually, everything around him was little white flakes falling from the sky, and people running to hold them in their hands, and children opening their mouths to catch snowflakes on their tongues. From the top of a window, he saw that an elderly woman and probably her grandson, were making all that snow fall with an ice machine.

Damian smiled, looking at the lit sign illuminating his face. His green eyes shone with the illumination of that whole place and with the words of that girl he only knew through a notebook. Of course he believed in her. He still had a smile on his face when his phone vibrated in his pocket and a message appeared on the screen.

_“I'm back in the city. Can I see you? xo - Emiko.”_

Damian took a deep breath and looked at the phone screen for a considerable time, before erasing the message and stuffing the phone in his pocket again. That was the past.


	6. The past comes back

_**December 23 - 10:00 am** _

Damian walked the streets looking around while holding the notebook in his coat pocket. He thought running out of town to get to the brightest spot in Gotham and trying to see the beauty in it would be her challenge, but what he actually found was an address on the next page when he had gone to write down what he was supposed to do and the further instructions.

And now, he was in a Japanese kitchen surrounded by older women who were preparing a Japanese sweet that he wasn’t familiar with and honestly never imagined making it.

He just needed to make the candy, the dough was ready.

Damian should have focused on the candy or whatever it was, but all he could think about besides Raven and what she looked like was the fact that Emiko had texted him the night before. Not just a message, but 3.

And all asking if they could meet.

His ex girlfriend was in town. She had come back for the holidays and said she wanted to see him. He wasn't sure what he was supposed to do. First of all they were friends, and Emiko was always there for him at times when he needed a friendly shoulder, like when Alfred died.

He knew he had overcome anything he felt for her now, and part of it was thanks to that girl from the notebook who in the past 5 days had made him feel things he didn't know he could feel. He thought that Emiko had broken his heart when she returned to Japan with her mother, but now he could see that they wouldn’t have lasted any longer anyway, their relationship was for pure convenience with no other feeling in it.

But still, that feeling of running back to what was known, for convenience and for what was within his comfort zone was still there. Even though he remembered how things were months before they ended. Damian preferred to spend as much time as possible in Gotham and Emiko spent almost all of her time in Star City.

They saw each other on special occasions, that wasn’t a relationship.

He honestly didn’t know what to do or how to respond.

He wanted to ask those women, an outside opinion seemed right but they would not understand. Apparently, they didn't understand English and Damian was not interested in practicing his rusty Japanese. And worse, his candy was not working, in fact, it looked like a goo spat out by some intergalactic monster instead of a delicious candy.

_"It's hard, isn’t it? When you can't depend on the language. Like when you try mochi in a kitchen full of Japanese grannies. You could ask for help...”_

\- "Never!" - Damian muttered, punching the candy against the table when he saw her provocation there, almost mocking his lack of delicacy and dexterity. All the other Japanese grandmothers looked at him then. - "Sorry."

_"But they wouldn't answer, even..."_

\- "Sadistic." - He grunted, throwing his first attempt in the trash. - "What's up, Rae... What's the secret?"

_“You can give up now, and it's okay. Thank you for trying and for responding, anyway.”_ \- Damian rolled his eyes and took the second try. He never gave up in the face of a challenge, he would not give up now on a damn candy. - _"The formation of mochi requires extreme concentration."_

\- "I am 100% focused." - Damian's phone vibrated with another message and he instinctively took it. The picture of Emiko appeared on the screen again, it was the fourth message she sent and he still didn't know what to do.

_“I know you're not in Hawaii. Come on, Damian. Let's talk. - Emiko.”_

Okay, maybe he was not 100% focused.

_“I know you have a lot of ideas in your head about how things should be and you even go to places high in Gotham to calm your mind. But in a quiet mind, sometimes the best solution to a problem is only heard, and it is exactly for this reason that I sent you there. I think what I'm trying to say is: ‘Just let go’.”_ \- He laughed, how could she know him so well? How could she know how messed up things were in his head? - _“Cliché right? But that's exactly why I sent you there. Take a chance, listen to your mochi.”_

The second attempt wasn’t bad, but it still wasn't perfect.

He managed to do something almost round, but it was hard and with the weight of a stone. It wasn't perfect, but it already looked more like the others they were doing.

\- "Look at this one." - He smiled, placing his backpack on the table - "Perfect."

But before he could celebrate the feast, one of the ladies took all of his work and threw it in the trash. It was not perfect and it was not correct. He would have to try again. Damian snorted and took the notebook, reading again what she had written.

_"Listen to your mochi."_

\- "Listen to my mochi?" - Damian took a deep breath, remembering the quick breathing technique he had learned in meditation in the park, then he closed his eyes letting his instincts take over his body. He just needed to clear his mind and stay calm. Listening to the mochi as she said, even though it still didn't make sense to him. When he finally finished, all the grandmothers in the kitchen looked at him as he opened his green eyes.

It had worked, he had gotten it right this time even though he was all covered in flour. Now he had something to show for his work and his backpack was packed with a box for him to take home.

He couldn't wait to tell her about his experience and propose a new challenge. Did she always look for a rainbow in the storm? Okay, he would give her a new way to deal with those feelings.

_You will see what awaits you, Rae._

_**December 23 - 12:00 pm** _

Maps sent the message late in the morning, notifying Raven that the notebook was there. However, Lois only allowed her to leave the house after lunch, so when Lois gave her approval she almost flew out the door in her excitement..

It was getting colder every day. It had snowed at dawn, and now the cold wind was cutting her face and making her nose and cheeks reddened and whipping through her dark black hair.

Her steps were decisively fast as she read the message the mysterious boy had left for her after she had gone through 12 hours of complete anxiety waiting. She was afraid he would have given up after she disappeared and she wouldn't blame him. But as she waited and hoped, he actually came back, and now in her hands there was a flour-stained notebook that showed that he had met the challenges.

She hoped he had managed to make the mochi, she almost didn’t herself when she tried and she never risked doing it at home. It was a simple candy, but it taught discipline and persistence.

_“Dear Raven. You surprised me again. Making mochi wouldn’t have been on any of my lists of things to learn how to cook, but you proved me otherwise. It was torture, but it was worth it. You know me well. Just wait and see what I prepared for you. An artistic workshop that I know you will love.”_

Raven looked at the glass facade that stretched across the building and read the sign on the door that said _"Break Room"_. She smiled and entered the space, being greeted by a lovely boy who took her to one of the tables full of fabrics and sequins and buttons.

Crafts? He could only be kidding if he thought it was a challenge for her. These challenges should be difficult.

\- "Welcome everyone." - The boy said with a smile, the room was already full of students. - “The purpose of our workshop? Create. Ramp up. Manifest what is occupying your minds. Do what you have in mind. Express yourself. Be free.”

Raven’s smile grew, she knew exactly what was on her mind and that person was the reason she was there. She hoped he had sent her to something equally challenging, but it seems that he had misjudged her.

Craftsmanship was her thing.

She sewed, glued, and played with all the fabrics she had at her disposal, and when she was finished, she could almost laugh at the result: a muppet from her paper friend.

When everyone was finished and each had to explain what their art meant. Raven saw interesting sculptures made of aluminum Coca Cola cans in claw shapes, as well as the towers of Wayne Enterprises buildings made of popsicle sticks.

\- "I made a Muppet." - She said, smiling and showing her work. - "It's how I imagine a friend of mine in real life." - They all looked at her trying to understand what it meant, and Raven cringed before reminding herself:

_"Believe"_

\- "He looks rude." - The advisor said while looking at the doll, and Raven laughed, feeling amused by it all.

She didn't need the approval of others, she had learned her lesson, and if she could congratulate herself, she would.

_"Your challenge is not over yet."_

Raven frowned, trying to understand. The challenge was to take a craft class, right? And she had already done that and it was very profitable. What else did she have to do?

\- "Very well." - The advisor said, drawing the attention of everyone in the room. - "Now that we have created, it's time to destroy."

\- "Wait, what?" - Raven said confused, holding the muppet in her hand.

\- “Free the mind of the corporeal baggage that materialized here.

\- "What is happening?"

\- "This is the Break Room."

\- "Right. Break Room. Where we all take a fun, creative craft break as a group."

\- "No. Break Room, where you literally break shit to feel better.”

Wait, what?

Raven ran and picked up the notebook. Gods she should have read all the rest of the instructions. This was not a simple craft class to relax, it was a “be animals and break things.”

She couldn't break the boy from the notebook.

_“You told me, when it rains, you always look for the rainbow. But sometimes, a rainbow doesn't show up. So what do you do? You stand in the rain and scream.”_ \- Raven opened her mouth and looked at the mirrored space where people now wore helmets and goggles, and with mallets and baseball bats in hand, they broke their creations as if they were wild animals.

Raven's mouth just hung open in surprise. Those people seemed too angry to be keeping all that emotion inside them.

_“Let it all out, all those messy, angry un-Raven feelings. Instead of hiding behind a smile, release your negative emotions. Beat the crap out of something. I guarantee you will feel amazing when you do.”_

\- "This should work." - The advisor said, handing her a pair of pruning shears. Raven held the scissors in both hands, thinking about what she was going to do. Destroy her friend? The person who was making her come out of her shell?

No fucking way.

Raven grinned and asked for a minute so she could write a message to the boy in the notebook. She had to leave him something, right? For sure, he would come back that day to look for it. After writing, she thanked the class and left, carrying the muppet in her arms. She liked to be hopeful and look for rainbows. She didn't need to be angry for that.

She had a daily ritual, going to Robinson Park at 11:00 am to meditate with Master Azar and then playing with other people's puppies. The union in her building did not allow animals, so she was content to play with other peoples pets. But ever since she started this game with the red notebook, she hasn't had time to do it again, and now it seemed like a good idea.

Raven spent a considerable amount of time playing with the same old dogs, before deciding it was time to go home.

It wouldn’t be a good idea to abuse Lois Lane's good humor.

When she was leaving the park, all the good humor and calm she felt started to go down the drain, when she was surprised by none other than the same person who made her run from the punk show: _Gar_.

\- "Raven Roth."

\- "Gar." - Raven said despondently, and prayed that her voice would not deliver how much she was considering running at that moment. - "What are you doing here? Are you stalking me? You wouldn’t do that. I think. But actually I don't know you all that well-”

\- “I looked you up on Instagram after the show. You only post dog photos at 3 p.m. and tag this park, so I've been coming here every day at three hoping to run into you.”

\- "That is the literal definition of stalking."

\- “You know, I assumed you'd have a dog yourself. It's kind of weird that you don't. Do you buy snacks for other people's dogs?”

\- "No. I make them.”

\- "That's so weird!" - Raven felt everything coming back, all the memories, every time she heard that stupid guy in front of her call her or her things weird, but this time she wouldn't bow like a frightened little child.

This time she would roll over to the other side.

\- “Did you just come here to call me weird? I got it. Yes, Weirdo-Central right here. Catch ya later."

\- "No, wait! I felt bad about what happened at the show.”

\- “Ah yes, the punk show. Where you said I looked like a freak. Which I probably did, so it's totally fine.”

\- "Hey, wait." - He held Raven's arm preventing her from taking another step. - "It was a compliment!"

\- "Compliment?" - Raven said wryly, - "I hardly noticed."

\- “Yes, man. Your dancing was awesome! You've always been able to let go like that, even as a kid. It always made me so jealous.”

\- "You were jealous of me?"

\- "I still am. And now look at you. You've grown up so damn cute. You've even got a puppet and everything.”

\- "Do you remember the last time you spoke to me?"

\- “Before the seventh grade, I think. After the fire I started, and my father sent me to boarding school in San Francisco. Why? Do you remember?" - Of course she remembered. It was the reason she wasn’t a normal girl today.

She remembered him every night, saying that she was all too weird, and then how he threw her friendship bracelet in the trash. But he no longer had that power over her, he no longer had the power to make her feel bad because she learned that being weird was actually a good thing.

She accepted herself as weird because there was someone in that city, at that moment, who was reading what she had written in a little red notebook with a smile on his face, and probably thinking she was cool just because she was weird.

\- "No."

\- “So... What are you going to do tonight? There's this slam poetry night around the corner. East Village artists confronting the bourgeoisie. You should come."

\- "Do you really like poetry?" - Raven made a face, trying to fit this personality in the little boy she knew from elementary school.

\- “I'm trying on my free spirit hat. Like yours. It's harder for some of us when it doesn't come naturally, but I'm trying. You're the real deal, Raven. You always have been. So, get used to it... Other people notice.” - He raised his arm and showed her the bracelet she had made in elementary school, wrapped there around his wrist.

Raven felt strange, confused. How did he have the bracelet after so long? He had thrown it in the trash, right? He smiled and walked away in the opposite direction she was going, waving at her and shouting that he expected to see her at the bar.

She wasn't sure if she could go. No, she wouldn't date someone like Garfield Logan, never in a million years would she date someone like him. He was the opposite of her, irresponsible, made jokes at inconvenient times, stingy, irritating and reminded her whenever she was a failure in society.

But could he have changed a little and was at least trying to be friends with her?

_**December 23 - 14:00 pm** _

Damian came into the room looking for the instructor, but only found an empty room and a scene of destruction on the other side. He wondered which one of those must have been Raven's job, honestly he couldn't imagine her destroying anything there so he needed help.

He held the box with the Mochi he had made, the only one that had come out correct. It was a reminder of what he should do to find the answers to his noisy mind, to listen to his mochi.

Silence the mind and listen within it.

\- "Your regular session today?" - The advisor said smiling, appearing beside him. - "I can let you use a Katana if you need to." He smiled, holding out the red notebook to him.

\- "I’m actually feeling pretty relaxed today." - He beamed and showed the box, while taking the notebook in his hands.

\- “Your friend is a born artist. The first Muppet we’ve ever had here.”

\- “Ooh, fantastic. Where's the corpse?”

\- “Well, this you will have to find out with her. She asked for a pen and to be alone and when I came back, she had left her notebook on the table with the pruning shears.” - He responded. - “But if you'll excuse me, I need to clean up that mess before the next session. Feel free to join if you want to participate.”

Damian looked at the room in front of him with a confused smile on his lips. Hadn't she destroyed the doll?

He returned home feeling lighter, happy that things were back on track and the challenges between them still continued. He took a long shower, he didn't have much to do but read what Raven had left for him and watch some stupid show on television.  
Maybe he could even open one of the bottles of wine in the cellar at the penthouse, he knew there was one where Bruce kept the best wines.

_**Bruce.** _

Damian tried not to let the thought of his father affect him. His relationship with Bruce was always a thin and fragile line, but they had tried while Talia was there. They had resumed their relationship after 10 years, and although their love had not changed in any way during those years, Bruce didn't seem to be able to connect the fact that he had a son and that son was 10 years old.

That fragile line broke when Alfred died and became almost non-existent when Bruce remarried an ex-thief, Selina Kyle.

Damian spent time far enough away that he didn't even go to the wedding. He busied himself as much as he could so he only had to read about the relationship of Gotham's billionaire son in the newspapers, and he felt good about it.

Soon Bruce would have other children, and he would become just one more out of the many he adopted out of benevolence, and who only showed up at the mansion at important parties. Not a legitimate child.

Damian shook his head. No, he wouldn't let that thorn between them bother him. All he needed to do was relax and do absolutely nothing. He could even just be in his bathrobe and slippers.

_“Sorry, notebook boy. I like to look for rainbows. I was unable to destroy my creation. But it's alright. Because this notebook is perfect for venting any emotion, good or bad. I can tell you anything.”_ \- Damian's phone vibrated again on the coffee table and he reached out to see if it was another message from Emiko, but to his surprise, it was a message from Crush.

_"I hear you're not in Hawaí, so you should come to my Christmas party."_

Damian rolled his eyes, he definitely wasn't going to Crush’s party. Not again, not alone. When he thought about putting his cell phone back on the table, it vibrated again, and now, with another message from Emiko.

_"You can't ignore me forever, Dami."_

\- "Oh yes, I can." - He murmured, throwing the phone across the room as he turned his attention to the book and his glass of wine. - "I can and I will."

He smiled and took the pen, thinking about what he would write. In fact, he started writing when the elevator door opened and the sound of laughter filled the room. And Bruce and Selina came in, finding Damian sitting in only his robe, underpants, and socks on the couch.

And with a glass of wine in hand.

\- "Father?"

\- “Jesus, Damian! What... What are you doing here?”

\- "What are you doing here?"

\- “Hi, I'm Selina. Nice to meet you." - The woman said smiling, raising her eyebrows at Damian for the robe he was wearing.

After the awkward moment and Damian asking for a minute to put on pajamas, Selina went to the bedroom to get ready, leaving father and son in the living room. The weather was as cold as the interior of an igloo in Antarctica, and Damian wondered if he could just leave.

Why was this happening to him the very day he was feeling wonderfully well?

\- "I was thinking..."

\- "I..."

\- "You can talk." - Bruce said calmly, signaling Damian to continue what he was saying.

\- "I was just going to say that I thought you would stay in Hawaii until the new year."

\- “We get tired of Hawaii quickly. Now we're going to go sailing in Half Moon Bay, California, but Selina wanted to stop by for coffee with Harley and Pamela. I took the opportunity to see how things were going.”

\- "So you weren't going to tell me you were here?"

\- "Shouldn't you be with Dick?"

\- "I am, but I needed to take a break, so I came to rest here."

\- "I believe you. You never had much patience for babies, just like your mother.” Damian looked at Bruce for a long second, anger bubbling up inside him. Bruce had become a complete asshole after Alfred's death. He was no longer as he once remembered. - “How about we go out to dinner? You, me, and Selina. Correct the first impression.”

\- "Great."

\- "Choose a decent outfit." - Bruce said, getting up and taking the glass of wine with him, leaving Damian alone as he walked towards the kitchen. Damian rested his face in his hands, counting to 100 to keep his cool. - "And you need to buy food if you are going to stay here."

\- "Okay."

\- "The only thing in the fridge is mochi." - Damian got up at the same time that Bruce took a bite.

\- "No, no, no, no, father this--" - Damian tried to stop it but it was too late. Bruce chewed on the mochi as if it were a requested and unowned chocolate. Damian knew he was having his patience tested and he knew it would soon explode.

How it exploded all the time in the year and a half since Alfred died.

\- “Good news, Selina! The kid is going to have dinner with us.”

\- "Oh that is great." - Selina said smiling, poking her head out of the room as Bruce walked towards her.

Damian walked around the room a few times, nervous and not sure how to act. His heart was beating a million miles a minute and he felt things bubbling up inside him. He wanted to have something to break right now. Or to punch. Or to just be able to scream.

_“Because this notebook is perfect for venting any emotion, good or bad. I can tell you anything.”_

Damian looked at the notebook lying on the couch, Raven's words echoing in his mind. She was right, that notebook was perfect for him to vent about all the feelings he had, good or bad. He took the pen and started to write furiously.

_“Raven, so my dad is in town, a true Christmas nightmare. To make it worse, I'm being strong-armed into dinner. Every year, an embarrassing meal on a different important date that culminates in a huge and explosive war of words with the old man who spends the entire meal trying to show that he is a good father. The only thing that helped me with these suffering dinners was Emiko... My ex-girlfriend, who had the natural gift of appeasing any conflict...”_

Damian looked at the paper and then tore it up, throwing that page into the fire.

\- "Nope. I can't do that. She will think that I still feel something for Emiko. No way.” - He took a deep breath and started writing again, determined not to quote Emiko this time.

_“Well, Raven, it seems we've run into a problem. I can't tell the girl I like everything, now, can I? Like how I really wanna meet you and think about you all the time.”_

\- "Yep, no, definitely not... She will think I'm a freak." - He shook his head and tore another page, throwing it into the fire again. How was he going to tell her that he liked her and thought about her all the time when he didn't even know her? She would definitely think he was a maniac. - "No way."

He tapped his pen on the notebook a few times before making a decision. It would be just to help him not turn the tables on his father and stepmother, it would mean nothing. Damian searched the room for the phone and dialed the number quickly.

\- "Hi! Are you free for dinner tonight?”

_**December 23 - 7:30 pm** _

Raven came home thinking about what had happened, but holding the doll tightly in her hands to remind herself that there was someone out there who loved her strangeness. And that someone actually liked the queen of weirdness that she could be.

Looking for the rainbow was her specialty.

The house was almost silent and if it weren't for the murmurs in the guest room, Raven would have believed she was alone. Lois had returned to Smallville probably after hearing Raven's advice, and Rose must have been taking advantage of Lois's departure to bring Jason back into the house. But as Raven approached the bedroom door, the more she noticed that they weren't whispering as usual, they were arguing.

\- "You're not paying attention."

\- "Yes, I am!"

\- "You’re not! I'm just going to New York! What about it? It's almost right here.”

\- “I already know what will happen. Our relationship--"

\- "Are you not even willing to try?"

\- "No!"

\- "Fine. Merry Christmas, Wilson!” - Jason said irritably, slamming the bedroom door hard while leaving with his jacket in hand. His turquoise eyes met Raven's, but before she could say anything, Jason walked out of the apartment.

She was sad that they had fought. Raven really learned to like having Jason at the apartment to keep them company. But then Lois arrived and caught them both and ended up banishing him from the apartment, and now it seemed they were done.

Raven knew that Rose would be sad in the bedroom and that maybe she needed time alone, but what kind of friend would she be if she left her best friend to suffer a break up alone? She knocked on the door three times with no answer, but she heard a few sighs and decided to go inside, even though Rose hadn't said anything.

Rose was sitting on the bed with her back to the door. She wiped her face quickly when she saw that Raven had entered, trying to maintain the tough pose she always had. Raven knew that it was a facade and that breakups always left her shaken.

\- "I'm so sorry." - Raven said leaning against the door. - "I heard. Did you and Jason... ”

\- "Break up? Yes."

\- "Because of New York?"

\- “He's leaving me, Raven. I've screwed up like this before, _'out of sight, out of mind'_ has burned me in the past. I don't want another long-distance relationship ever again, I'm sorry.”

\- "Are you alright?"

\- "Obviously not."

\- "Look, long distance relationships aren't so bad."

\- “Yeah, how do you know? You've never even dated anyone.”

\- "The notebook boy." - Raven said blandly. She knew that Rose was just spewing things out of her mouth because she was nervous about the fight she just had. Rose laughed wryly and turned to Raven, her eyes full of anger.

\- "OK. That is not a relationship, it’s pen pal. You can still mail him your notebook from San Francisco.”

\- "Why would I mail him my notebook from San Francisco??" - Rose took a deep breath and said nothing, just kept looking ahead, eyes lost on a fixed point. - “Rose...? Why would I mail him my notebook from San Francisco?”

\- “Do you really think your mother went on a vacation in San Francisco? Raven wake up, your aunt lives in San Francisco and your mother thinks you can live with her there.”

\- "WHAT?"

\- “If your mother can find your aunt, you will go to live with her. And she will stay here because she has a job here.”

\- "What if I don't want to go?"

\- “What difference does it make? She thinks that this city is not a good influence for you and that living with your aunt will be better for your education.” - She gave a wry laugh, - "And your aunt Lois, your mother, and I just didn't tell you because we knew you were going to freak out."

\- "You all just lied to me?"

\- "I guess we're both having a shitty Christmas." - Raven looked at her in disbelief and then shook her head and stomped out of the room. They had all lied to her this entire time, they all made decisions that were about her life without consulting what she wanted.

Would her mother simply abandon her in San Francisco with an aunt she never had contact with?

Before locking the bedroom door, Raven heard Rose call out to her again, but paid no attention. She didn't look back because she didn't want to hear Rose tell her that she was sorry and all that bullshit. She had lied too, she had encouraged Raven to start to like someone knowing that Raven would have to leave soon after.

That was cruel and Raven wasn't in the mood to hear a lot of shitty apologies.

Raven felt something bubbling up inside her, an anger that she hadn't remembered before. She tried to look for the rainbow as usual, but she didn't want to find it, no, this time she wanted to blow up the rainbow.

She tried to calm down by reading something while holding the muppet she had made in craft class. When that didn’t work she tried to meditate, but nothing made that anger pass, every second she tried to forget that her whole family had lied to her, the more the anger stayed.

Perhaps if she spoke to Maps, maybe she would have good news that by some miracle the boy in the notebook had left the notebook there. She closed the book and quickly dialed the video store’s number. On the third ring, a voice answered.

\- “Hi, could I speak to Maps? Has she gone home already? Okay, can you tell me if there's a red notebook there? Why? Because I am very upset and I need to write to vent. No, I don't want to rent a movie, I... Hello?” - Raven looked at the phone screen and noticed that they had hung up on her. - "Shit!"

Raven snorted and looked at the clock, she needed to breathe fresh air or she would freak out completely and break something. She grabbed a coat and stomped out onto the street, aimlessly walking through a Gotham filled with happy people and happy snowmen.  
She looked at the snowman for a few seconds before the boy's words echoed in her head.

_“Get it all out. Purge negative emotions. If you don't find the rainbow, stand in the rain and scream.”_

Raven gave a manic smile and with the broom that one of the snowmen held, she started to destroy them one by one, screaming and getting all the anger she felt out. Angry at her family for lying to her, angry at her friend for being rude when she just tried to be nice, angry at the boy at the video store who couldn't even tell her if the red notebook was there. Angry at her mother for making a decision to send her to the other side of the country without consulting her will, anger at Lois for thinking she was a china doll that could break, and especially anger at Garfield for appearing again in her life acting as if nothing had happened.

Oh yes, it felt great.

Raven looked at the poor snowmen destroyed on the ground and laughed like crazy, before letting her feet lead her to the bar where Garfield said he would be for the poetry battle. Oh she wouldn't swallow frogs again, she would spit them all out and start spitting some frogs in his face.

She rushed through the bar, taking heavy steps towards the stage in the darkness before the host announced the next poet.

\- “Applause for the last poet of the night, bravo! Okay, well ... Our next poet is ... ”- A round of applause rang in Raven's ear before she went on stage uninvited, pushing the poor poet to the chair he was sitting in before. She took the microphone without waiting to be announced, the piercing screech of the feedback making her cringe. - "Oh... I think it's her apparently."

\- "I’m sorry." - Raven said, breathlessly. - “It's just that I'm in the mood, you know? Gar. Are you around here? Gar? No?" - Complete silence and then some whispers came from the audience. Great, wasn't he there? Fuck it she would put everything out there anyway. - "Well, I just beat the crap out of some thing’s, and it felt amazing." - Some whistles came from an audience that was anxiously awaiting her.

\- "Good!" - Someone shouted in the darkness of the crowd.

\- "Thanks!" - Raven said laughing, feeling the adrenaline coursing through her veins. - "Thank you! Yeah. Because It's okay to say that things suck. my family right now? They suck. And, uh, these wall sconces. Sorry but, uh, suckfest on ice!”

\- "You go, girl!" - Another person shouted through more applause and whistles.

\- “Because I won't be holding back any longer. Not after San Francisco! The truth is this: I am not happy and positive all the time. In fact, I usually feel small, insignificant, and like an outsider because... ”- She looked at the audience once again and her eyes focused on a single greenish spot at the end of the bar, almost hidden. Coward as he always was, hiding in the darkness. - "Because of him!" - Raven pointed to Gar at the back of the bar and the spotlight waved over him. - "There he is! My elementary school bully in the flesh. The night of the dance when you got that bracelet you’re wearing...” - Raven felt things flowing from her without being able to control it and her eyes burned as if she were about to cry. Maybe she was, but she didn't care. She was going to expunge those feelings from her once and for all. - “That night changed everything for me. Because of you, I always stayed at home instead of going out and making friends. I changed schools and didn't want to go to class. I don't go to parties, I run away from clubs. You kept me from wanting to go out and... and put myself out there, and you stopped me from doing all the things that I wanted to do for so long. And the worst part is that you don't even remember. And now you have the audacity to ask me out?”

\- "Maybe he liked you!" - A voice in the darkness shouted.

\- "No! No! I'm tired of boys pulling our pigtails and getting called cute! Right?" - A wave of screams and whistles filled the place in support of what she had said. - “I get so mad about all this... I'm so very mad! I'm mad at you! I'm mad at my mom! I'm mad at Rose and myself!. But you? You don’t have that power over me anymore, Gar. You don’t.” - She smiled thinly, - “I wish I could have gone up to you that day after the dance and told you how upset you made me. Got it all out of my system and lived a normal life. I wish I could have stood up to all the bullies who made me feel too weird, too different, too much like a freak. But you know what? I was only 10 years old.” - He got up and walked a few steps towards her.

\- "So was I." - He grimaced, - “I didn't know I had done all this. I'm an idiot. I'm sorry, Raven.”

\- "No! You don't get to reverse the situation!”

\- “I feel terrible. I wish I could go back in time, but... Can I redeem myself with you?”

\- "And how would you do that?"

\- "Do you want to go to a Christmas Eve party tomorrow with me?"

\- "What?"

\- “It is with some friends I met in San Francisco. I can introduce you to them, I'm really good at parties.”

Raven made a face and then thought hard about what was going on, putting things in perspective. She might be able to go to that party, right? Lois was no longer in town and Raven was in no mood to spend Christmas Eve with Rose after that argument they had.  
She knew that she had promised to never go out with Garfield in a million years, but she wouldn't go on a date with him, right? It was just a party with a lot of other teenagers like her, maybe she would even socialize and make friends.

And if she didn't accept it, it would prove that Gar still had power over her, power over her fears of rejection. No, he didn't.

\- "Mmm." - She scratched her throat, - "Okay."

_**December 23 - 7:30 pm** _

The dinner was awkwardly quiet, Damian felt as if he were tied down to a huge weight that he couldn't get up from, and his father and stepmother seemed to feel a similar weight. They looked anywhere in the restaurant, anywhere except at each other.

Emiko said she would come, but they were already at dessert and she still hadn't shown up. 

Maybe she had thought the better of it, and keeping him company ended up not being the best idea ever. Perhaps she had remembered that Damian's company was not the best.

Damian snorted and pushed at things on his plate, unwilling to eat.

\- "So..." - He murmured before looking at Selina, - "What did you most enjoy doing in Hawaii?"

\- "Oh..." - She smiled, - "Boat trips and Kitesurfing."

\- "Ooh... Lovely."

\- "Do you like it?"

\- "Mmm... No."

\- "Oh."

\- “Mmm... Waiter, can you bring me sparkling water with a slice of lemon? Please?" - The waiter nodded and withdrew, making the silence grow between the three again. In the name of all the gods, it had been a complete mistake to accept to go to that dinner. He could feel the tension building and he knew it would not be long before the explosion of insults started. - "Do you also surf?"

\- "Yes..." - Bruce said smiling, looking at Selina, - "Selina is an athletic intellectual. Damian never liked to go out to have fun with any sports besides fencing or anything that involved punches and swords. He wouldn't touch a ball even if me or Alfred or his mother tried.”

\- "Why do you want me to touch balls so bad?"

\- “He always preferred chess with Alfred. I thought it was just a phase and soon he would be interested in football like any other kid.” - Damian opened his mouth to answer, but the words were gone at exactly the same moment. He knew that Bruce blamed him for Alfred's death even though he was not to blame for it. And he knew that the bond between them had not existed since then, but that was cruel.

Before he answered, Damian heard a familiar voice at the door, and when he looked he recognized the owner of the voice. Emiko was talking to the matradee, she looked exactly the same way that Damian remembered her. Short hair, held in place by a red hair bow. It didn't seem like 365 days had passed since the last time he saw her.

The feeling of settlement filled Damian's chest.

She smiled and waved at him, then thanked the metradee and approached the table where they were sitting. Thank gods she arrived before this thing completely exploded.

\- "What is the subject?" - She said, smiling and sitting down next to Damian.

\- "Sports and Chess." - Selina said, looking at Damian with a look of surprise in her eyes.

\- “Always a pleasure to see you, Emiko. I hope Oliver hasn't been angry with you for coming to this side of the bay.”

\- “Bruce. How long has it been?" - She smiled at Bruce in a loving way. - “Oliver has already given up being irritated by my inclination to the Wayne family business a long time ago. And you must be Selina Kyle.” - She looked at Selina, - "Damian has talked a lot about you... Oh what a beautiful diamond on your finger!"

\- "It is a lovely pleasure to meet you, Emiko." - Bruce looked at Selina with a smile, but Damian was still frozen in place, not sure exactly how to react. After spending a whole day ignoring Emiko's messages, he sincerely thought it would be easier to deal with an ex girlfriend for the purpose of a favor.

It clearly wasn't.

\- "Mmm... Hi again."

\- "Hi again." - She whispered to him, - “I already found the nearest exit. Hold on, soon it’ll be over. ”

\- "So..." - Bruce said, drawing their attention again, - "You just returned from Japan, but you were able to find time for my son?"

\- "On the contrary." - She said with a grin, - “It was Damian who made time for me. He's been in demand. It was hard to nibble a little time with him, thanks for calling me back by the way. I just got back from Pittsburgh. Mom had spent time there. You know, athletes are always moving around.”

\- "Oh Pittsburgh!"

\- "Yeah. I always wanted to travel with Damian, but he always preferred to stay in San Francisco, or read in the mansion's library.” - Bruce said, shaking his head, - "Why was that Damian?" - Damian took a deep breath, thinking about what he really wanted to answer with. 

Why did he never want to travel with Bruce? Was it because Bruce never actually invited him? Because since his mother died, Bruce has always been traveling with his current socialite girlfriend? Or because Bruce cared more for his new wife than with how his son was feeling? Or is it because Alfred, and Jason, and Dick were more his father than Bruce was after the accident with Talia happened? What reason did Bruce want to hear first?

\- “What, Damian? Are you going to fight with me again?”

_"Listen to your mochi"_

\- "Listen to my mochi" - He whispered.

\- "I'm sorry, what was that?" - Bruce said, looking at Damian confused.

_“Sometimes the best solution to a problem is to just be heard, but only if your mind is quiet. It is difficult to overcome old habits, to open up to something new. But if you can, notebook boy, I promise to try. I hope you answer soon.”_

Damian exhaled and closed his eyes, pulling the concentration to his fingertips again. Allowing the same feeling of calm he had when he followed the advice of the girl in the notebook to flood through him. Her words echoed in his mind with serenity and Damian was suddenly calm, relaxed.

When he opened his eyes everyone was looking at him like he was crazy.

\- "Well, I was just thinking how you used to take me to that bookstore near the penthouse." - Damian said calmly, looking at Bruce. - “Do you remember?”

\- "Gotham's Bookstore?"

\- "Yeah."

\- “Taking you there was the only way I could get you to leave the fencing class.”

\- "Well, I loved to go there with you." - Damian shrugged, - "It was probably where I first fell in love with books, I think. And we always had ice cream after hours of looking for books between the shelves ... And when we came back, Alfred had always made cookies."

\- "Really?" - Bruce said surprised, and Damian nodded, - “You would love the one we found near the hotel in Honolulu.

\- "It was beautiful, so tiny." - Selina said, smiling at Emiko and Damian, - "Bruce could hardly fit inside."

\- "Oh yes... No kidding, it was super tiny."

\- "He ended up being all clumsy and bumping into things!"

\- "We could go there one day..." - Damian happily replied, seeing Emiko out of the corner of his eye smiling at him, surprised that things didn’t become a game of offense. He noticed Bruce seemed just as surprised. The scowl he usually carried was gone, looking like the man Damian vaguely remembered when Talia and Alfred were still alive.

Damian didn't remember the last time a dinner was so nice, all because he took the advice of a girl he knew so little of.

She was magical, he was sure of it. Why didn't he meet her before?

As they were leaving the restaurant, Bruce suddenly turned to Damian, giving him a quick, awkward hug, as they waited for the valet to bring the car back to the airport.

\- "Uh... When I get back, how about we stop by that bookstore?"

\- "Sure." - Damian said, slightly frowning.

\- "Yeah?"

\- "Yes, of course."

\- "I’m glad that you and Emiko got back together."

\- "Ah, no, we didn't get back together."

\- "Bruce, the car has arrived."

\- "I'm coming, Selina." - He chuckled and held out his hand to Damian, - "Whatever that means to you teenagers... Are you sure everything will be okay at Christmas?"

\- "Yeah... I'm going to Grayson's house tomorrow." - Damian lied, he still held onto his own autonomy and freedom to walk around Gotham following the leads of a mysterious girl.

\- "Okay, see you in the new year, son."

\- "Ok... Merry Christmas." - And with a nod from Selina and Bruce, Damian saw his father's car leave for the airport, with the feeling that things may be different from now on. Damian couldn't wait to tell the girl in the notebook how much her advice helped him at that dinner, and he couldn't wait to introduce her to Bruce when he finally met her.

\- “Umm... Excuse me? Who was that?” - Emiko said, laughing and hanging on his shoulder, - “It wasn't the Damian that I met. You didn't even need me!”

\- "Thank you for coming tonight. I know it probably wasn't what you meant when you asked to hang out.”

\- “I'm glad you invited me. I liked seeing you again.”

\- "Me too."

\- "Uh... The reason I wanted to talk to you is because... I'm moving back to Star City."

\- “Oh? Wow!"

\- “And I wanted to know if we were okay. But it looks like we are.”

\- "Yes."

\- "Friends again, then?"

\- "Sure." - Damian shrugged, - "Friends sounds good."

\- "Hey, the guys from school agreed to hang out, if you're not socially exhausted..." - She smiled, pointing with her head, - "Do you want to go? I wanted to introduce you to a new person.”

\- "Mmm... Will Crush be there?"

\- "Oh shut up" - She laughed and held his arm, pulling him along with her. - "Come on, it will be fun... Besides, I think you will love talking to Wally, he is as nerdy as you."

\- “Well, you first need to explain to me who Wally is. And I'm not a nerd!”

Damian and Emiko arrived at a bar full of people his age, with pop music playing over loudspeakers, making people talk too loudly. He should have said he was socially tired, first because he wanted to get back quickly to write in the notebook what had happened, and second, because he really was socially exhausted and Emiko spent the entire time all the way there, telling about the adventures of living in Japan and how amazing Wallace West it was. She hadn't told him with all the letters she wrote him that they were together, but from the way she talked about that boy, it was stamped right on her face.

\- "Damian Al Ghul Wayne?" - Crush's voice came from behind one of the chairs, - "Back from Hawaii and out of the house after 11p.m."

\- "Hi!" - Emiko said, greeting the girl.

\- "Hi to you too, Crush."

\- "I must be seeing things."

\- "Christmas lights make you even more calculating."

\- "Aw, you are so adorable." - She said wryly, and then rolled her eyes and walked away, meeting another girl in a purple dress. Djinn.

Emiko chuckled before pulling him over to a dark-skinned boy with a lightning bolt drawn in his haircut. He was talking animatedly to a boy with green eyes and hair.

\- “Good to see that things have not changed while I was away. So, "- She touched the boy's shoulder, - "Wally, this is Damian ... The friend I told you about."

\- “Your ex? Hey man... I hope you don't mind.”

\- "Damian, this is Wally that I told you about... My boyfriend."

\- "Mmm... Hi. No, we broke up a year ago and... I'm meeting another girl... Me and Emy are just friends and that's it, no hard feelings."

\- "I know, I was kidding you, man." - Wally poked Damian's arm, - "I would never take another guy's girl."

\- “Yo! Damian? The high school imp?” - The green-haired boy who Damian struggled to try to remember called out, - "Garfield, remember?"

\- “Ah! Of course... ”- Oh shit! The annoyingly annoying Garfield Logan from San Francisco High School. The stupid, petty, irritating, irresponsible, and not-so-funny boy that Damian unfortunately knew. - "What's up, Logan?"

\- “You will enjoy listening to this one: I am coming from a poetry evening. Okay? No institution is immune to poetic justice, is it?”

\- "Wow, Logan has changed." - Damian said, wryly.

\- "Yeah, actually, I learned a lot today."

\- "Me too."

\- "Are you going to Crush’s party tomorrow?"

\- "Yeah, Wayne." - Crush said, with a winning smile on her lips and her arms around Djinn's waist, - "Are you coming to my wonderful Christmas Eve party, that many would sell their souls to go to?"

\- "I will!" - Garfield said, smiling - "I will take a girl with me. She is incredible, a free spirit.”

\- "Wow, amazing." - Damian said, with a thin smile, - "Congrat-" 

\- “Oh, hey you there, sunshine!” - And before Damian could finish saying 'congratulations', Garfield was already walking towards other girls, putting his sticky arm on another girl's shoulder.

\- “If you don't want to, that's fine, but we could go together. The three of us... As friends.” - Emiko said, - "Wally doesn't know the team very well and I feel that he will end up feeling out of place..."

_"I think what I'm trying to say is, 'Just let go'."_

\- “Sure, let's go. Why not?”


	7. Christmas Eve

_**December 24 - 11:00 am** _

_"Dear Raven, I am getting closer to an old friend that came to spend the end of the year in the city, and our friendship has a complicated history."_

\- “You have no chance of throwing my sweatshirt away.” - Damian said, rolling his eyes as Emiko held his arm in horror to inspect the hole in the shoulder of the red sweatshirt he wore. It was his favorite article of clothing. The most comfortable piece he had. And the gods in heaven and the demons in hell knew how much he valued comfort above anything, and how he hated changes, even in the smallest amount.

\- “But it's so old! It's ripped at the shoulder.”

\- “I know, but my sweatshirt is like Hagrid's jacket. It's magic." - He said laughing as they walked towards the next challenge. This time, Raven had been quick to respond to him about Christmas Eve and what challenge he was supposed to do. As soon as he woke up, there was a message from Maps telling him about the notebook, and Emiko was willing to accompany him on a tour of a side of Gotham that he didn't know, even after having lived there for so long. She had enlisted Damian's help to buy her boyfriend a gift anyway. - "I love to stick my hand in my pockets and not know what I'm going to find." - He put his hand in and pulled out something from inside - "Oh, moldy muffin."

\- "Ugh!" - Emiko scrunched her nose. - "As your friend and potentially your wing woman, I recommend that you let me style you if you intend to meet someone today."

\- "No. In fact, I kind of did meet someone.”

\- "How is it _‘kind of’_ meeting someone?"

\- “It's a funny story. One day I was at Gotham's bookstore, bored enough to argue with the information clerk, and I found this notebook.” - He showed the notebook to Emiko. - "she IS a girl, her name is Raven and she is so... amazing!"

\- "Oh my god, you're in love."

\- "What?" - Damian grimaced, - "No, I'm not..."

\- "Of course you are… Your eyes are shining just talking about her. So... When am I going to meet her?"

\- "I'm not in love with her, this is just a game..." - He said, avoiding that particular topic. - "She intrigues me, that's all. I haven't even met her yet.”

\- "Wait, you don't know each other personally?"

\- "That's why I said _'I kind of'_ met someone. We challenge each other in this game we play, and in meeting that challenge, we have the right to a personal question.” - He smiled, opening the cafeteria door for Emiko to enter. - "And that's why we're here."

The challenge that Raven had proposed to Damian was simple, just try a pie. He had accepted her proposal to try to get out of his comfort zone and try new things he had never done before. She had said she would start slowly for him with a simple pie. Damian chose a table for the two of them and ordered the pie exactly as instructed in the notebook, Emiko looking at him incredulously.

\- "So you just do what she says without question?"

\- “She doesn't ‘make me’ do the challenges... She proposes them for me and I propose some challenges for her in return. It's fun."

\- "You’ve really changed."

\- "I have known more of Gotham in these last few days than in my entire life... I even meditated."

\- “And you don't think about meeting her? Talking to her?” - Emiko furrowed her brow - "I mean, I would worry about trusting a person that I have never even seen, someone I only knew through a childish game in an old notebook."

\- "That's the point of the whole thing, trust." - A waitress placed the plate with the pie in front of him, the cheese melting gooey on top. - “It is the basis of any relationship. She trusts that I will not screw with her and that I am not a manic pedophile, I trust that she is a teenage girl who has socialization issues.” - He said, rolling up his sweatshirt while Emiko looked disgustedly at the plate.

\- “How do you trust a girl who challenges you to put cheese in a pie? That is just wrong.”

\- “Raven is, um, unique. I'm into it."

\- "That’s why you made me come to Gowanus, for a pie?"

\- “It's how the game works, I need to meet the challenge and report how it went. Well... ”- He dropped his head and took a piece of the pie slice, tasting it and hoping to hate it. But to his surprise the taste was more pleasant than he expected. - “It tastes good. Emiko, you should try it. I thought it was really good.”

\- "I'm happy for you, Dami." - She smiled. - "Finally found the perfect girl in your head."

\- "What does that mean?"

\- “I mean that boys usually have a conception of their ideal girl in their mind with which they compare everyone they know. So, this notebook challenge is a great idea. If you never meet Raven, she can forever be the perfect girl that you imagine her to be.”

\- "No. One day we'll see each other. We just want to get to know each other first.”

\- “And I think that is super-romantic, but I’ll tell you one thing: when you put girls on pedestals, they fall, and that's when you can be disappointed and disappoint a girl who trusts you. Take care and make things clear to her if this is just a game for you, this girl is apparently giving you her heart.” - Damian took a deep breath, reflecting on what Emiko was saying. - “Now, finish this pie right away and let's go shopping. I need to buy Wally's gift and you're going to buy another coat. That torn and punctured sweatshirt is going to the trash today.” - She stood up, - "We need clothes for Crush’s party."

Damian smiled, still reflecting on what Emiko said. As he finished eating the pie, he thought about what he would propose to Raven in the next challenge. Emiko was right, he needed to reflect better on what he wanted with that girl.

Raven had become someone special to him in a very short time, only a matter of days. She was kind and seemed to understand him better than anyone ever had. He cared about her well-being and was anxious to see what she had answered. Knowing that she had released her anger the night before and faced her past made him feel as confident as he was when finding out about new things, getting out of his comfort zone.

She deserved more than cool words from him. She deserved that they take the next step in their game, because he felt different things for her now, and he wanted to know her more than anything.

He liked her even though he wouldn’t admit it out loud. He liked to talk to her, and he liked how they challenged and understood each other.

She deserved to know his name.

_**December 24 - 04:40 pm** _

Raven found the notebook in the cafe, in the exact spot where she had challenged the notebook boy to eat the pie. The waitress had delivered it to her almost as soon as she sat down at the table, along with the slice of pie with cheese that she always ordered. Venting to him about what had happened the night before made her go back to her better mood, and now she couldn't wait to read what he had left for her. Donna and Kory had gone with her and were getting hot chocolate from the counter.

_“Dear Raven, I am getting closer to an old friend that came to spend the end of the year in the city, and our friendship has a complicated history. Thank you, Raven, for helping me to be flexible in the face of my past. You gave me a Christmas that isn't that bad. In the name of reciprocity, my Christmas present to you will be my name. I'll leave the notebook with Mrs. Elizabeth Bennet so it can be under your tree for Christmas.”_

\- "So... You mean the guy in the notebook is the one who made you go clubbing?" - Donna said, smiling, as she sat in the chair next to Raven, Kory right behind her.

\- "He seems cool for a teenager."

\- “So... We heard about San Francisco. I'm sorry, Raven.”

\- "It's all right. It is not definite. I'm trying to stay positive.”

\- "You have a PhD in positivity, so I'm sure you will succeed."

\- “Furthermore, any outcome is good. You would be moving to paradise. Gotham is a hellhole. So solve any pending issues and run away.”

\- "Okay, they put cheese on the pies here?" - Donna said, making a face, trying to change the subject. - "That is sacrilege."

\- "Until I liked it." - Kory said, and made a content sound. - "I would put mustard on it if I had it."

\- "Gods, expel the devil from this body!"

\- "Seriously, try it."

\- "Speaking of casting out demons..." - They continued talking and Raven smiled. It was easy to be with them, even if they were older. They made it easier. She took the opportunity to write the message she would leave for him. She was looking forward to finally being able to know his name at last. So caught up in that she couldn't even get excited about the party she was supposed to go to in the middle of the night. Not when she would wake up the next morning and finally know who the boy was for whom she had grown feelings for.

Raven started to count the minutes and the seconds for this to finally happen.

She came home to finish her clothes for the party, Gar would pick her up at 7:30 p.m. and she didn't want to be late. And she still had to leave the notebook for Maps before going. Oh, she almost couldn't control her heartbeat.

Raven sat on the floor, pasting the details on her sweater when her eyes rose to the muppet. For a second, Raven felt like she had been cheating on him for going out with Gar to a party. She was being paranoid, of course. Gar would only take her to the party as a way to redeem himself for what he had done to her. There was absolutely no way she would do anything else with him.

She would return home at 11:30 p.m. and sleep, but anxiously waiting for the next morning and the boy's name in the notebook.

Part of her wanted to cancel her plans and most of the blame was on that muppet's look.

\- "Why are you looking at me?" - She murmured to Muppet. - "It's not my fault another boy asked me out before you." - Raven rolled her eyes and went back to her sweater, only to be interrupted again, but this time by Rose.

She and Raven hadn't talked since the argument the day before and Raven still didn't feel well enough to try. The wound was too fresh and the cold way Rose had said everything just hurt her badly.

\- "So... Do you want to play Catan?" - She said with a guilty smile, holding the game box at her bedroom door. - "Christmas Eve tradition."

\- "I don't play Catan with liars." - She said, without looking up from her sweater.

\- "You know, for the record, I didn't lie about San Francisco. I omitted." - She raised an eyebrow. - "It's different." - Raven continued to look at her, placing the finished sweater on the bed so that the glue would dry while she was getting ready. - “I'm sorry for the rudeness, okay? The breakup with Jason hit me hard and I took it out on you. And that was dumb because you are my rock, my soul sister.” - Not even a single word came from Raven's lips, she just kept looking at her dress. - "I would love your help to forget that _hashtag love_ is officially dead."

\- "Look, even if I wasn't really mad at you, I can't, because I have a place to go tonight."

\- “With the notebook boy? I take back what I said, _hashtag love_ is officially alive!”

\- "Actually, it's with another boy."

\- "You didn't tell me there was another one at stake."

\- "I omitted."

\- "Okay, I deserved that."

\- "Actually, I could really use your advice on how to cancel."

\- "Cancel? Why cancel? My advice is never to cancel a date.”

\- “First, it's not a date. I'm just going to a party that he invited me to. And second, am I not going to be cheating on the boy in the notebook with another?”

\- “That is the definition of a date Raven. And no, you are not cheating on anyone, having a range of options is healthy.”

\- “What if I don't want to have a range of options? I like the notebook boy.”

\- "I also like him. Mainly because he encourages you to get out of your bubble. But a flesh and blood guy! Am I right?” - Raven gave Rose a blank stare. - "Please don't tell me he's another Muppet."

\- "Something against the Muppets?"

\- "Yes." - Rose grimaced. - “Look, this notebook boy is cool and you guys enjoy it and I see it but, he hasn't even asked you out yet. What is he doing?"

\- "Rekindling an old friendship."

\- "What a bastard!" - Rose said, looking at Raven in shock. - " _'Old friendship'_ is code for an ex."

\- "No. _‘Old friendship'_... It must be a friend from school.” - Rose looked disbelieving, and reason fell on Raven's head like an anchor. - "Oh no. Oh no no no no no, oh my God, of course it's totally code for an ex. His friend said he has one.”

\- "See? He has experience. And you also need to arrange for that before... ”

\- "Before San Francisco, I know."

\- "Look, I know that changes are scary, but if you want to meet the boy from the notebook, tell him." - Rose said, placing her hands on Raven's shoulder. - "You two deserve more than that."

That left Raven thinking for most of the rest of the day. She couldn't get out of her head the fact that he could actually be with his ex at that moment and "rekindling an old friendship" while she was just waiting for the things he said. The insecurity was there again, making her skin itch and her certainties become doubts.

Raven sighed and shook her head, it didn’t help her to corrode her insides about the possibilities or ‘what if’s’ That would only make her more insecure again, and there was only one person in the world who could give her the certainty she needed. She picked up the phone and typed the message to Maps, letting her know the time and place to pick up the notebook at the coffee shop they had met in before.

When she arrived, the cafeteria was empty, but Maps was sitting alone at one of the tables. She looked quickly at where Raven was and motioned for her to sit at the other table, so that they were back to back.

\- "Hi."

\- "Hey. Speak softly. No one can notice us together.” - Raven took the menu and pretended to read, not paying attention to anything that was written on it.

\- "You definitely didn't tell him that we met?"

\- "No! He thinks I found the notebook on the shelf. Our conversations are 100% off radar.”

\- "Great. Because, _off radar_ , I was wondering how stupid I am, you said your friend has an ex. Is there any chance that they are still talking?”

\- "Of course not! Him and Emiko broke up for real. She even moved to Japan.”

\- "Great. He mentioned an _‘old friendship’_ , and everyone knows that this is code for exes, so I thought ... ”

\- “No, you have nothing to worry about. Emiko is a long way away.”

\- "Good."

\- "You know, he didn't tell me about any _'old friendship'_. That is strange." - Maps said grimacing. - "I'm his oldest friend, as far as I can remember." - Raven was silent, the notebook weighing in her bag like a pile of stones and insecurities. - “It must be nothing. I know him, he wouldn't hide something like that from me and he wouldn't do anything wrong with you.” - Raven took a deep breath and closed her eyes, wondering if she should hand over the notebook or just walk away.

\- "Fuck," - She took the notebook and handed it to Maps, - "Can you give it to him before I change my mind?"

\- "Yes, I will see him today at a party." - She held the notebook, having to use a little force to get out of Raven's insecure hands. - “I'll make sure I give it to him. And...?"

\- "I know. We never met.” - She said, getting up and walking away without looking back, her mind a mess of confusion. Now more than ever, Raven wondered if he had omitted something for her too. Maps had guaranteed that she knew him well enough to know that he wouldn't do something like that to her, but did Raven know him well enough for that?

She trusted him, she had trusted him all this time.

Raven pushed these concerns to the back of her mind as she returned home. She would have her answers when the notebook returned to her hand the next day, she didn't have to worry about all of that now. He had given her no reason to worry about that.

Raven took the time she needed to get ready while trying to stay in the mood for a party, not that she had a good mood for it to begin with. After Rose told her that it was characterized as a date, her excitement to go out with Gar fell dramatically. When she finished dressing, Rose shouted that a car was waiting outside for her.

\- "Hey, Raven!"

\- "Hi."

\- "Hi." - He ran to open the car door for her - "Cool sweater!"

\- “Ah. Thanks." - She laughed nervously.

\- "Only you look good with a sweater like that, looking like a Christmas tree."

\- "Are you sure it's okay for me to go?"

\- "It's okay... I'll introduce you to everyone."

\- "Look, I don't know what you're expecting but..." - She took a heavy breath - "If you're expecting for this to be a date, I don't want to fill you with hopes... I... I like another guy and we are just getting to know each other and- “

\- "Hey. Relax, mama... It's just a party.” - Raven sighed and bit her lower lip, nodding slowly. - "Okay. Ladies first" - He opened the car door for her to get in.

\- "Thanks." - She got in the car, and while she was putting on her seat belt, Gar got in too. Then she heard the noise of someone hitting his head, and soon after, Gar grunting with his hand on his face. - "My God, are you okay?" He made a few more grunts before he started laughing and Raven didn't understand what was going on.

\- "I got you." - He said between chuckles, - "I got you, that was a good one."

Raven looked at him, forcing a smile that probably looked more like a frown as the car drove off towards Neville's luxurious apartments. She was beginning to regret accepting this already. 

Garfield was an idiot.

_**December 23 - 08:00 pm** _

Damian looked at the numbers going up in the elevator, mentally trying to get ready to face a party with people like... Crush. He started to regret accepting coming to this party initially but now there was no turning back. Not when he spent most of the afternoon looking for things with Emiko specifically for this party.

He had even bought a new coat.

When the elevator door opened, he inhaled deeply and let it out slowly, getting much needed oxygen to his brain. And to his surprise, Maps was there talking to Emiko and was honestly not looking the best.

He could already feel Maps tugging at his ear for not telling her about Emiko being back. He had forgotten to, and in the end it didn't seem necessary. It's not like he and Emiko have anything to hide.

Damian had only omitted unnecessary information.

\- "Hi, Maps and Emiko."

\- "Hi." - Emiko said, smiling.

\- "Slim pants and a turtleneck?" - Crush's voice came laughing behind Damian. May the gods help him on this night. - "Someone is all stylish trying to impress his ex today!"

\- "I brought a pie." - Damian said, handing Crush the box he was carrying.

\- "Do you believe he even cried in the store when I made him throw away the frayed sweatshirt?"

\- "I didn't cry."

\- "Wait, you went shopping with Emiko?" - Maps said, pointing to the two.

\- “It looks really like you, goblin, all rich and spoiled as you are.” - Crush said, crossing her arms. - “And I'm actually really glad Emiko got you to come because I can use you. I need to do a book analysis for an AP lit class and want something impressive.” - Damian opened his mouth to answer but, Emiko was faster.

\- “ _‘In Cold Blood’_ , _‘On Beauty’_ or _‘Kafka on the Shore’_... They are your favorites, aren't they, Dami?"

\- "Yeah."

\- “Well, thanks, Damian behind Emiko. And thank you both for dessert.”

\- "Wait, did you go to buy clothes and dessert with Emiko?"

\- "How nice to see the crowd gathered!" - Crush said with a grin, while leaving to put out the box that Damian had brought.

Maps still looked shocked and she had a good reason for that. Emiko was clearly with someone, the silver ring on her finger announced that to all eyes there, but did she spend all day with Damian? And now she was speaking for him just as she did when they were together?  
She looked at Damian in a way that he fully understood what she was asking for. She asked for explanations and they would have to be given here and now.

Damian excused himself and went out to talk to Maps away from everyone else. Already thinking about how he would explain to her that he and Emiko were just friends now, and that he even helped her choose a gift for her boyfriend, and that her boyfriend probably would arrive at the party soon.

\- "Did you spend the day with Emiko and didn't even tell me?" - She said irritably, when they arrived in one of the rooms.

\- “Maps, it's not a big deal. It's just friendship.”

\- "I know. Well, I’m your best friend, so it’s my duty to say she’s bad for you.”

\- "What? What are you talking about? I thought you liked Emiko.”

\- “Of course I like Emiko! She is the nicest and friendliest person in the world and she knows how to use a bow and arrow!” - Maps said, throwing her arms up. - “But she’s wrong for you. You’re already recovering your bad habits with her.”

\- "What bad habits?"

\- “Damian you are a spoiled little boy and extremely boring when you want to be, especially when you dress like the damn Wayne you are, I recognize that as your best friend. But even so, you have a way of dressing when you're not in your _'Damian Wayne prince of Gotham City'_ mode. In the short time that you guys dated, she would dress you up and speak for you as if you were her muppet! And you have already followed her like a mute zombie Ken.” - Damian opened his mouth to answer but he didn't know how to answer. Maps was right and he had no way of refuting that. - "More importantly: are you having fun?"

\- "This talk is not helping."

\- "Look..." - She took the notebook out of the bag and showed him, - "Raven... She amuses you. She brings out the best in you, she challenges you.” - Maps handed him the notebook.

\- "Okay..." - Damian sighed, nodding. - "You're right. All right, well, I promise to keep you abreast of all of my whereabouts going forward.”

\- "Great. And by the way, I have to go.”

\- “Already? Why are you leaving?"

\- "Yeah, I'm seeing a double feature of It's a Wonderful Life and Crazy Rich Asians with Billy."

\- “Billy? What Billy?”

\- "The Macy's elf." - She beamed - “See, doesn't feel good, does it? Look, beware of Emiko. Don't blow a good thing with Raven, all right?” - She gave Damian a hug and then left, giving him one last wave.

Damian stood there by the bed thinking about what Maps had said. He knew she was right and he knew that Emiko would do those things unintentionally. He hoped it was not intentional. But still, she did them.

And he knew that the girl in the notebook was making him a better person. It was the truth because he felt better ever since that notebook came into his life. He felt welcomed, understood and even loved.  
He didn't even know her well and he felt it all just by reading her words.

That girl was special, he liked her. He liked playing this game with her, he liked being challenged by her, and he couldn't stop thinking about her. About what she would be like or how she would look. The past few days had lit a flame inside him that he didn't want to put out, not now that he was so close to knowing who she was.

Not now when he knew they were taking a step closer to finally meeting and getting to know each other even better.  
Damian looked at the notebook in his hands and took a deep breath, throwing himself on the bed as he opened to the page that was marked. His nose being flooded with the scent of lavender and vanilla.

_“Dear notebook boy, today I saw a poster for Pixar's new film, Collation. Did you see it? It's a love story. Like You’ve Got Mail, but with office supplies. Of course, the female protagonist is literally a piece of white paper, but the poster is beautiful. And I keep thinking about the trailer, in which the highlighter voiced by Dinah Lance says ‘Have courage.’...”_

\- “Oops! What's up, you bore?” - Garfield's voice sounded in the room, throwing a pile of coats on Damian and making him almost jump. - “Reading at a party? That is so Damian. Hey... I love you man, but you're so weird.”

Garfield smiled and left the room, leaving Damian alone again with his thoughts. Was it his imagination, or had the scent of lavender and vanilla been stronger since Garfield had thrown that coat over him? Damian shook his head, rolling his eyes, Garfield was an idiot.

_“I wish you were here with me to be inventing puns with office supplies. But ‘have courage’ seems right. You encouraged me to have more courage than I ever had. So it's time for me to say: This notebook is not enough anymore. Time to get our list out of the pages and meet in person. What do you say? Maybe we could go and see Collage.”_

Damian couldn't control the smile that grew on his face and how his heart sped up when he read those words for the thousandth time within a second. He wanted to respond and be able to deliver it to her right then and there if it were possible. He searched the room looking for a pen because he needed to tell her that he felt the same way.

That girl had won him over in a way that no other had. Just with words.

_"Dear Raven, I wish you were here with me too."_

_**December 23 - 08:40 pm** _

Garfield opened the door for Raven to enter the building's luxurious hall. It was decorated with Christmas lights and trees up to the elevators, two to be more precise. It was very luxurious by the standards that Raven was used to and Raven was used to the luxuries afforded by Zatanna.

Suddenly, she felt nervous, as if she wasn't dressed up enough.

\- "Are you alright?" - Garfield said. looking at her as they entered the elevator. Raven felt that she could vomit, but she couldn't tell if it was out of nervousness or because she was considering this whole thing a bad idea.

\- "Me? I’m fine. I'm not at all nervous about the party.” - She lied. - “Is it hot in here? Not that I'm sweating.” - She took a shaky breath and looked ahead. - "I'm kind of regretting about this sweater."

\- "Don’t worry." - He held her hand with a secure grip. - "You are with me." - Raven looked at his hand squeezing hers and took a deep breath, letting go of his hand quickly, crossing her arms over her chest.

\- "Yes." - She murmured, taking another deep breath to try to push the nervousness away. She watched as the numbers increased and changed on the sign until they reached the roof of the building. She could hear there was pop music playing and people talking animatedly. To Raven's surprise, Maps was leaving there with a frown as she put her coat over her shoulders. Her eyes widened when she saw Raven.

\- "Maps?"

\- "Oh... Hey!" - She said, a little shocked - “Small world, isn't it? What are you doing here?"

\- "I came with a... colleague." - She pointed to Gar, - "And you?"

\- "I came to see a... A friend..."

\- "Ah..."

\- “Anyway, I need to go... I need to meet other people today. Have fun at the party, Raven.”

\- "Are you already leaving?"

\- "Yes..." - She smiled, waving to Raven as she walked towards the elevator. - “See you later Raven! Merry Christmas!" - And before Raven could talk more, Maps quickly entered the elevator, punching the button hard to close the door. Something about her was weird, out of place. It was as if she had seen a ghost.

Raven wanted to have her there for more conversation. It would be nice to have someone she knew there. Gar walked off to greet others and Raven felt out of place. Everyone there was well dressed. In dresses that were clearly Gucci or Dolce Gabanna, and she was wearing a sweater that lit up and looked like a Christmas tree.

Unintentionally, Raven pulled her jacket over her body.

\- "Give me your jacket." - Garfield said, taking off his. - "I'll hang them up and we can say hi to the crowd." - Raven looked at him, wanting to say that she preferred to keep her coat, but she took it off and handed it to him. Thinking that maybe she would be more ridiculous with that coat on plus those ornaments on her sweater. He smiled and took the coat from her hands. - “Make yourself at home, okay? Walk around and maybe talk to someone.”

Raven scratched her head, too nervous to think about talking. He had said he was going to introduce her and now he had left her there without knowing anyone, her own luck. Raven huffed out a breath, trying to clear her thoughts as she decided to risk it. That was what she had promised the notebook boy, right? Take a risk.

Raven walked among the teenagers in beautiful dresses and well done makeup trying to find something she could participate in. Some conversation that she could relate to, but they didn't even look at her, much less try to include her in something. So more and more, she was going to the back or the room, looking for the shadows to hide in.

Garfield talked to everyone, almost like he was a star, and all the girls seemed easily attracted by his dubious mood. Raven rolled her eyes, nothing had changed.

\- "Okay guys." - The voice of a pale girl with black hair said, clapping her hands and calling everyone to the living room, - "Crucial decision." - Raven was leaning against one of the pillars while the other people sat on sofas with their chic drinks.

Raven's eyes darted across the room, falling on a boy who seemed too bored to be there. She had a feeling that she had already seen that boy somewhere but didn’t remember where.

He was tall, with emerald green eyes and beautiful cinnamon skin.

\- "We are all here, Crush." - A girl said from the small crowd.

\- "This is a vital decision people. Home Alone or Home Alone 2?"

\- "Guys, what is this question?" - The boy Raven was looking at finally said, rolling his eyes. - “The geography of New York in the second is an atrocity. I mean, Kevin lands at an airport that magically overlooks Manhattan... It's like landing in Metropolis and instead of seeing Gotham's trash, you see Star City or Central City.” - He said, too seriously, and Raven found herself watching him, noticing how he had a nice accent. She still had a feeling that she knew him. - “Then he goes from the Empire Diner to Chinatown and to the top of the World Trade Center on foot, and somehow, goes up to the Plaza in the middle of winter. Have you ever done this journey in New York? ” - The silence that lasted from everyone in the room was excruciating, but he rolled his eyes and took the cup he was drinking. - “But I still love the movie. Let’s go with the second.” - Raven found it so fantastic that she couldn't help but laugh, which sucked. The silence of the room echoed her laughter everywhere, and with that, all eyes went to her. Especially the eyes of the boy who had given his geographic analysis about a comedy film.

He seemed as if he was trying to recognize her as well, his eyes hadn’t left her person since.

Raven felt her cheeks flush and get hot. It was better to get out of there before she did any more damage, and hey, the candy table looked empty enough now. She spent some time there looking at all those pink and chic things while she decided what she was going to eat. When she reached for a macaroon, another hand reached out too, and to her surprise it was the boy who seemed familiar to her.

\- "I’m sorry." - He uttered with a thin smile, before taking a step back and letting her take it.

\- "Oh, no problem." - Raven said, embarrassed. They were silent for a few seconds and Raven tried to look at everything but him.

\- "Mmm... Cool sweater." - He said, breaking the silence after a little while.

\- “I’m aware that I look ridiculous. But thanks anyway.”

\- "No! I’m sorry. You look great." - He raised his eyebrow. - “I look ridiculous. Look at my pants. Like... Fancy.” - He made a face and Raven smiled, finally feeling strangely comfortable around him.

\- “I have a secret, I didn't show this detail to anyone. Check this out.” - she pressed the buttons inside her pocket and the lights came on and he smiled, not as if he was mocking her, but as if she were someone fun for him.

\- “Oh! It's a Christmas tree!”

\- "Yeah. It is a Christmas tree.”

\- "It’s impressive."

\- "Thanks."

\- "You know, I hate those who would label a sweater as ugly."

\- "So, I would like to say that yours is unusually attractive."

\- "Thanks." - Raven beamed. - "Well, your pants are beautiful on the inside." - He made a face and she suddenly noticed what she had said. Why couldn't she talk like a normal teenager once in her life? - “Metaphorically saying, not literally. I don't know what is in your pants. What they're like on the in... inside.” - It was better to eat, she was making everything worse. Raven took one of the macarons and stuck it in her mouth while looking away, but he just smiled.

\- "Where do you know Crush from?"

\- "Who’s Crush?"

\- "You are eating her macaron."

\- "Oh..."

\- "Yeah..." - He said, raising his eyebrow and smiling sideways.

\- "I don’t really know anyone here."

\- "Ah, I get it. So then you're a burglar.” - Raven laughed, nodding. - “Okay. Tell you what, actually." - He laughed and waved for her to approach him while whispering, - “I will let you rob the joint as long as you, please, take me as a hostage. I can't take this party anymore and I will use any excuse to leave.”

\- "Show me where they keep the jewels?" - Raven said laughing, joining his joke.

\- "We will be at the border before they notice we're gone."

\- "Why does that seem easier than being at a party?"

\- "Only those who are comfortable at parties are people like... Him." - He pointed to Gar talking to two other girls and making the same stupid joke he had made in the car with Raven.

\- "Do you know him?"

\- “Garfield Logan? Yes. He just does whatever pops into his head. Whatever random, just stupid, stupid, idiotic thing. I don't know, people love him, especially girls. I don't really get it." - Raven tried not to laugh at that, policing herself not to agree verbally with him. She didn't want to appear ungrateful that Gar had taken her to that party. Her eyes roamed the party and she saw a girl talking to another not far from where Garfield was. She was perfect in her red party dress and hair bow.

\- "What about her? She's so pretty. Center of the crowd. Practically glowing. You know, I see girls like her, and it's like they speak a different language.”

\- "Actually, she speaks six."

\- "See? I bet she was never alone at a party.”

\- "The different is doomed to loneliness."

\- "Brave New World" - Raven said, smiling from the corner of her mouth, feeling the sensation of knowing him grow even stronger in her chest. As if she knew who he was for a long time, as if she could sit and talk to him about anything that existed.

\- "Yes!" - He said smiling back, looking surprised that she knew. - “We can be lonely together. I'm Damian.” - He smiled, and held out his hand to her. Raven looked at his hand and squeezed.

\- "I am-"

\- "I knew you would be in a corner." - The owner of the party said, hanging on his shoulders. - “It's almost Christmas. You promised us a dance.”

\- "Ei! Come on, Damian? Flirting with my girl? ” - Garfield said, coming too and putting his arms on Raven's shoulder. She looked quickly at the boy she now knew as Damian and nodded, pushing Gar a few inches away from her. - “I think this party's getting a little too tame. I say we, uh... We spice it up a little bit, huh?”

\- “You like dares, don't you, Dami?” - The girl in the red dress said, joining the conversation - “How about we play _Truth or Dare_?”

\- "That’s... a great idea." - Garfield said smiling, and Raven started to feel even more uncomfortable. She didn't want that, and that cute boy she was talking to, the one she felt she knew, apparently had a girlfriend. It was impossible for him to be single at a party like that.

It was a mistake to go to that party, she should have remembered that.

They all crawled to a kind of bench and Raven wanted a hole to open under her. Garfield always found a way to put his arms around her even though she was using all her strength to push him back, and now all she wanted was to go.

\- "So, who' s next?"

\- "Me." - Crush said, with her hand up. - "So... Truth or dare, Damian?"

\- "Please don’t."

\- “Oh come on. Don't be boring.” - Raven noticed his breathing exasperated and his mouth forming a thin line when he nodded.

\- "Fine. Mmm. Truth."

\- "Are you in love with someone lately?" - He shrank looking at his hands, then looking at the girl Raven had talked about being perfect. She was listening to someone on the phone and he looked at her for a long second in silence before taking a deep breath. Raven noticed him looking distracted, as if thinking about someone, before a small smile appeared on his face. 

\- "Mmm... Yes."

\- "Is that someone here at the party?"

\- "I-"

\- "Hey, Dami." - The girl on the phone came over to him. - "Can you come here?"

\- "Sure." - Raven watched them talking in whispers further away from the group, trying not to appear nosy, until she took his arm and they left saying goodbye to everyone there.

Raven swallowed the strange lump that formed in her throat. Why did she feel this way? Why did that boy mess with her like that? It's not like she knew him from before.

Even though she felt she had known him for a long time.

\- "Okay, now it would be Damian's turn to answer but it looks like he has more important things to do with Emi." - The girl said, with a playful tone, while the other people murmured laughing. - "So it's me again and ... Now it's your turn." She pointed to Raven, who felt each of those looks on her. Gods if someone could dig a hole so she could just throw herself in right now. - "Truth or Dare?"

\- "Mmm... Truth."

\- "What was... The craziest place you had sex?" - Raven opened her mouth and then closed it again, trying to find what to say. She felt all eyes on her, especially Gar's eyes, and that made her uncomfortable and ashamed. The girl who had asked seemed to understand that Raven was not the most experienced person on the subject and made a face. - “Nothing? Okay then, what is the craziest place you've ever made out?” - Raven started to feel small, scared, as she did in the punk show. As if she were an alien, something out of this world, and all those people were looking at her with raised eyebrows and waiting for her to respond. - "Held hands?"

\- "Mmm..." - Raven tried to say something but nothing came out.

\- "Okay..." - Garfield said laughing and finally got her out of that situation. - "My turn." - Was he drunk? Raven couldn't say. - "My dare is that we all play strip poker."

\- "We play this every year..."

That was the last straw for Raven. She was sure that this party was not for her and that she shouldn't have gone there. Should she have listened to her own subconscious and canceled it anyway. Why did she thought she could fit in with people she never met and who had a completely different kind of fun than her idea of fun, she’ll never know? She was not a normal teenager like all the others. She wore a green sweater decorated with Christmas ornaments and star-shaped earrings, while those girls wore Cartier jewelry and Gucci clothes.

Raven walked among them, going to get her coat while she thought about how to get home. In the end, her plan to return at 11:30 p.m. was being realized. She would be home before 10:00 p.m. practically.

When she was standing in front of the elevator, Garfield ran over to her holding onto her arm.

\- “Hey Raven, wait! Don’t go away. It' s fun here!”

\- "I have to get home before 00:00."

\- "At least let me call your Uber."

\- "All right." - She huffed and looked down at her feet. - "Thank you." - He looked at her for a few seconds before smiling.

\- "Are you serious that you never kissed anyone?"

\- "Why? Because I’m weird?”

\- "No, because you are beautiful." - He took her hand and bent to try to kiss her and all Raven managed to do was to swerve quickly before he kissed her. - "What?"

\- "No! What are you doing?" - She looked at him almost shocked.

\- "Kissing you." - He invested again, and narrowly, almost pinned Raven against the elevator

\- "I... I'm not interested, I said."

\- "But I thought that you-"

\- “You thought wrong. I never fell for your spells Gar, not even in school. I thought it was cool that you were fun and had a lot of friends but I never wanted you.” - She put her hands in her pockets. - "I made that clear when I said I didn't want to give you false hopes and that I was meeting a guy."

\- "Oh." - He looked discouraged.. At the same moment, his phone vibrated in his pocket. - “Oh this is embarrassing. I'm so sorry. This holiday surge pricing is way too expensive, and Steve is such a dick about keeping me on a budget. Can you call your own Uber?”

\- "Gar, it's your turn!" - Someone shouted from inside the party.

\- "Well, duty calls me." - He smiled, taking a few steps back. - "Good night, Raven."

\- "Good night, Garfield." - She said, taking steps back and letting the elevator door close, feeling her heart racing for what had happened. She never wanted to meet with him again, not when he was just nice to her because apparently he still thought that all the girls in the world wanted him.

Effects of popularity at school probably.

Raven spent the whole way in the car thinking about the boy she had met at the party, the boy named Damian. She tried to remember somewhere she had seen him before, going through in her mind all the places she usually went, but giving up completely when nothing resembled the boy she met.

And her head was full, too full to be thinking about someone she couldn’t even seem to remember. He was probably too busy with a perfect girlfriend anyway.

Raven was lying down when Lois called her, pleased to see that she was home half an hour before the appointed time and saying that she hoped she had fun with the choir. Raven didn't go into details about the party being with the boy who made her a recluse nowadays, for Lois, it didn't seem necessary now.

When her eyes were almost closing, Raven felt the memory hit her with the weight of an anvil. She had seen that boy the day she first gathered the choir, she bumped into him while running.

 _He was handsome_ , she thought, _much more handsome than she remembered_.

_**December 23 - 10:40 p.m.** _

Damian drove towards the Gotham Bridge in silence. Emiko had told him that Wally was lost and that Gotham wasn’t exactly the best place for that. They were already minutes away aimlessly driving through the city.

\- "I'm sorry to take you out of the party so early, it's just... I told him to take a taxi but he couldn't do it."

\- "It's okay, it's not like I'm having fun at all." - He shrugged. - “He won't be able to take a taxi now even if he begs. Gotham's taxi service is just as rubbish as the city itself. He might be able to get an Uber if he was willing to pay a lot to go to Crush’s party.”

\- "Yeah, I know..." - Emiko said, breathing heavily. They were silent for a long minute and Damian noticed that she was starting to get restless. As if she wanted to say something, but she didn't know what or how.

\- "Emiko, what is it?"

\- "Hm?" - She looked at him, one eyebrow raised.

\- "You are restless"

\- "Is nothing."

\- “I've known you long enough to know it's something. You always look like that when you're hiding something.” - He stopped the car and turned to look at her. - "No games, what's going on?"

\- "I... I shouldn't think about it." - She still didn't look at him. - "But, spending the day with you made me about you... About us."

\- "What?"

\- "Don't get me wrong, I love Wally." - Emiko put her hands on her face. - “We met when I was in Pittsburgh and we connected and completed each other. But spending the day with you reminded me of the past, of when we were together. If I had a time machine, if I could go back in time... I would go back to when we were together.” - Damian opened his mouth and closed it again, at a loss. - “Wally isn't here, he wasn't going to the party, he went to visit Barry this morning. I lied, I needed to be alone with you to be able to say that.”

\- "Are you serious?" - Damian was still in shock. - "No, you're not serious."

\- "And why not?"

\- “Come on. We didn't break up just because you moved to Japan. It was also because of me. I created barriers, I wasn't on your side most of the time and when I was, I wasn't myself. And you know we hadn’t been a couple for a long time before we broke up.”

\- "I agree, but you’ve changed a lot."

\- "Maybe, but we haven't changed." - He said firmly. - "At the party, you almost answered everything for me."

\- "I just wanted to help. I know how you don't like to talk at parties. How you don't even like parties.”

\- "Yes, but if you always speak for me, I will never speak to anyone." - He gathered his thoughts, - "I don't need you to protect me and I'm sure you don't need me to protect you."

\- "You're right." - She nodded yes. - "But, I just wanted to make sure that everything between us is over." - She licked her lower lip. - "I just wanted you to remember that I didn't want to end this."

\- “It was me, I know that. I didn't want a long distance relationship. There was already too much distance between us.” - He closed his eyes. - “I'm with you here but... I'm thinking about her.”

Emiko sighed, eyes lost in the deserted street in front of them before nodding. Damian looked at her expecting some reaction, preparing in case she cried or screamed or anything, but she just sighed.

\- "You are a disappointment as an escape companion, Damian" - She said looking at him again, a faint smile on her lips and Damian chuckled, taking a deep breath while taking the weight off his back

\- “Look, I don't want to start this thing between us again. And I don't think you do either.”

\- “You don't understand because you’ve always lived only in Gotham. For me, every year my mother took me to a different place in the middle of the year, and I had to start again. But I came back and... You were always comfortable. Familiar.”

\- "Like the sweatshirt you made me throw away." - He said, giving a wry smile, making Emiko smile too.

\- “You’ve changed, Damian. But I see now that you have changed for her... ”

\- "So it means that what we had is over."

\- "Yeah..." - She sighed. - "It's sad, but it's good to know that you found someone who will make you change for the better. I am happy for you Damian, and I hope she makes you happy.”

\- “I hope you are happy with Wallace too. He seems like a nice guy.” - He gave a thin smile, his hands still resting on the steering wheel. The silence that grew between them in the car was both painful and embarrassing. It was like he was breaking up again and again, but this time, he really wanted to put an end to it.

Finally he felt a sense of lack being filled, like a cycle coming to an end.

\- “Well, now I'm ashamed because I took you out of the party and it turned into something disastrous, but what did I expect?" - She looked at him with an embarrassed smile. - "I saw that you loved her when you first spoke about her. What an idiot I am. But, what do we do now? We are in the middle of a deserted Gotham street"

\- "We better go home." - Emiko smiled and nodded.

\- "So…” - She held out her hand to him. - "This time for once and for all, can we be friends?"

\- "Yes…” - Damian reached his hand out, squeezing hers gently, feeling the weight leave his shoulders. He felt free. Free to move on without any strings attached, without having to think about Emiko or what he would do if she were there. - “Friends."

She nodded, seeming to feel the same kind of relief that Damian did. The weird tension that existed between them had completely dissipated and they were fine again. As if there was never dating, or separation, or pain between them.

The feeling that Damian felt before. like something was still missing between them, was gone completely now. He could finally feel his heart completely free to be handed over to the girl with the red notebook.

He drove for about another 30 minutes, until Damian found her to the hotel not far from where the party was at Crush's.

\- "Can I give advice, as a friend?" - She said looking at him with a wry smile. - "If what you have is real, she deserves more than a Christmas notebook."

\- "But I don't even know where to find her."

\- "The city is not that big." - Emiko said, before getting out of the car. - "Merry Christmas, Dami. Good luck with your ideal girl."

Damian stood looking at Emiko entering the building while letting what she had advised him to fall into his mind and take root. She was right, Raven deserved a Christmas present far more than just a gift notebook, she deserved that they knew each other and he felt that she deserved that too.

He started the car again, driving to the penthouse while trying to calm his heart, Emiko's words echoing in his head as he remembered what Raven had said to him in the last message. She also wanted to meet him and he could no longer bear to just talk to her through messages. That night, Damian made a plan in his mind as he fell asleep. That would be the last message he would send to her through the notebook, it was time to take the next step.

 _"The city is not that big."_ He thought, _"And he would find this girl before the new year,"_


	8. So it's Christmas

_**December 25th - 08:30 am** _

Raven loved Christmas morning. It was her favorite day on the calendar, and she spent every day of the year counting down for it to arrive.

Every year, when she woke up, she saw her family in matching pajamas in front of a tree full of Christmas presents. They had this tradition since Raven and her extended family had known each other, since she was a little girl.

But that Christmas morning, everything was different.

Her mother was in San Francisco deciding her life for her without even consulting her first, Lois and Clark were in Smallville with their children and family, and she was home alone with Rose, just hoping that there would be a notebook under the Christmas tree. Her party the night before had been almost a complete disaster. A reminder to herself that she would not fit in, no matter how hard she tried.

And Gar? Apparently he had only taken her to put her on the list of girls he had kissed. Ew, rude. She wouldn't kiss that boy in a million years.

Raven looked at the deserted room and the empty Christmas tree with no gifts, and everything seemed too cold. As if breaking a tradition took the colors from the place, turning everything to gray and cold. As Gotham itself was.

But she actually had something to cheer about. Finally she would know the name of the boy she had been talking to for the past few days, and who was now making her heart pound in her chest with anxiety. Raven crawled under the tree, searched among its branches, under the rug and every corner, but found nothing.

Not even the shadow of a red notebook.

\- "Merry Christmas!" - Rose hummed close to Raven, making her almost knock the tree down while she jumped up in a hurry. Rose held a square object wrapped in red and white wrapping paper that looked very much like a notebook.

\- "Merry Christmas!" - She ran and took the package from Rose's hands, almost tearing the package. - "The notebook, finally!"

\- "Actually, it's a book about serial killers that I bought for Conner." - Raven looked at Rose for a few seconds, trying to find something that would denounce that she was lying or playing a game with her. But her pity face delivered more than Raven wanted to believe.

She was speaking the truth.

\- "Shit." - Raven murmured handing the package to Rose again.

\- "Look, if the notebook hasn't arrived yet, there must be a reason."

\- "Yes, you are right."

\- "Did you have fun at the party?" - Rose said, making a face, trying to make Raven feel better. But it didn't seem to work. In the place where Rose always found a warm smile and a cheerful soul, there was now a frown that walked away, stomping hard against the floor back to her room, slamming her room with unnecessary force.

Raven thought hard about what she should do, as she looked at the wallpaper of lavender flowers that descended from the ceiling to the floor. Maybe Zatanna just hasn't had time to visit her yet, maybe she hasn't even woken up yet.

That meant that Raven could go to Zatanna's house and pick up the notebook for herself before going to the last meeting of her choir group, right?

Raven fiddled with the wardrobe, looking for the ideal outfit to wear, but giving up soon after and appealing to the first one she saw there. She just needed to have that notebook in her hands with the boy's name, and his answer about them meeting, so she wouldn't feel like she did.

She felt as if that Christmas had no more salvation, and she hated to feel it.

When Raven decided what to wear, her eyes fell to the floor where she kept the blue rubber boot. Holding on to it since she knew the boy in the notebook would keep the other boot to meet her.

That day seemed like the ideal day to use it.

When she was coming down the stairs, almost tripping over her own feet, Raven found Lois, Clark, Jon, and Conner arriving with bags of gifts and food. Lois looked at her in surprise, waiting for an explanation of where she was going.

\- “Mmm... Merry Christmas Aunt Lois and Uncle Clark. Merry Christmas Jon and Kon.”

\- "Merry Christmas, Raven." - They all said together, before Lois looked at the two boys and Clark. And that look was enough to tell them to go up to the apartment without asking for explanations. When Lois heard the door click shut, she looked at Raven for explanations. 

\- "Where do you think you're going?"

\- "Elizabeth Bennet's house... I mean, to see Aunt Zatanna."

\- "Why? We came to spend Christmas with you so that you are not alone.”

\- "I... I promised to help her make cookies.“

\- "That is one of the things I know she hates to do."

\- "There was no one celebrating here and I didn't know you would come..." - Lois took a deep breath, admitting that Raven had a point. If she had agreed to spend Christmas with other people, it was because she had said nothing about the Kent’s coming back to spend Christmas with her.

\- “Okay, but come back by 6 p.m. We are going to make dinner, and I want you to be here.”

\- "Okay! Thanks!" - Raven smiled excitedly, and kissed Lois on the cheek before, running out the door. Wearing her blue rubber boot on one foot and a red sneaker on the other.  
Raven tried to stay positive as she walked towards Zatanna's house, letting the morning breeze hit her face. There was no reason why he didn't leave the notebook, right? He had promised her as a Christmas present.

Raven rang the bell and a still sleepy Zatanna opened the door, seeming to wonder why someone was knocking on her door so early on Christmas morning. But her face lit up when she saw Raven standing there.

\- "Good morning my dear!"

\- "Good Morning!"

\- "Come, get in... It's too early and too cold for you to be outside."

\- "It's almost 9:30 in the morning."

\- "Still early." - She said, giving space for Raven to enter.

Raven breathed in deeply when she smelled the warm smell of incense and herbs being burned. Zatanna's house always smelled like that. She was very mystical, Raven knew exactly where to find herbs and crystals for anything. Raven had an amethyst crystal kept in her room, a gift from Zatanna when she turned 5.

\- "Tea?"

\- "Always" - Raven smiled, walking down the hall towards the spacious kitchen, as she followed Zatanna. She went to the kettle, and filled it with water to boil as she turned to Raven, looking very elegant in her robe. - "Merry Christmas!"

\- "Merry Christmas, honey!" - She smiled. - “How can I help you this Christmas morning? Tired of being under the tyranny of Lois Lane??”

\- “Did someone leave something for me with you? Uh... Maybe something red in the shape of a notebook?”

\- “I haven't seen our mutual friend since he brought me a boot. Is it the companion that one I see there?” - She pointed to Raven's feet with a smile.

\- “He said he wanted to meet me. I don't know when it will be,”- Raven said, smiling shyly as she looked at the boot. - "But if I have the boot on, he'll recognize me right away."

\- “Have you thought about what you're going to do? If the person in person is not the same person in your head?”

\- “You met him. You liked him. ”

\- “His meticulousness charmed me, I admit. But what you like is what matters, and that you will have to find out for yourself.”

\- “He said he was going to bring the notebook here. What if he forgot? What if I startled him by saying some nonsense?” - Her phone started to vibrate with four messages, and she had to stop her desperate thoughts to check. It was just Donna and the choir group. - "It's my choir group." - She smiled, pointing at the phone and looking at Zatanna. - "They want me to meet them at the Iceberg Lounge."

\- "Ah... The Iceberg..." - She smiled, as if remembering a distant memory. - “I went there with Bruce Wayne once. They didn't allow women in yet, but they made an exception when Bruce called that weird little man, Cobblepot and... ”- She stopped saying whatever she was going to say and looked at Raven, who was waiting for the end of the story. - "Summary of the story, they let me in after a magic show." - She grinned. - "You should go and hang out with your friends."

\- "What if the notebook arrives?"

\- "I’ll manage to deliver it to you." - She said, with reassurance and sipping her own tea. - "naimaD enyaW..." - She said, putting her hand on her nose, as if she had sneezed, but Raven knew a fake sneeze well. What had she said?

\- "What?"

\- "Nothing... A new magic word that I'm making up." - She said, nonchalantly. - “Say a word backwards. It always makes me sneeze.”

\- "What word?"

\- "I said: Have fun, dear." - Raven furrowed her brows and scratched her head, trying to understand what Zatanna was talking about, as she walked towards the door. It didn't make any sense what she had said, but she knew there was no point in trying to ask Zatanna to explain. from the face she made, Raven could put her under torture and she still wouldn't explain.

Raven walked around Gotham City towards the Iceberg Lounge in deep thought. Trying to understand what could have happened to the boy in the notebook not to have left it for her, and trying to understand what Zatanna had said. She knew she should let it go. Zatanna usually said things backwards while trying some new _‘abracadabra’_ but something told Raven to go deeper, to think about what she had heard.

Until she gave up on frying her own brain, and began writing down what she heard on her cell phone message pad. If she had the notebook in hand it would be easier. Gods why didn't the boy leave the notebook?

\- "What was that word again?" - She murmured to herself, trying to remember perfectly what Zatanna had said. - "naimaD..." - She murmured, typing quickly. - “Why naimad? The other word was what? Ah enyaW... Back to front, okay... Mmm... D... A... M... I... A... N... W... A...Y... N...E "- She tapped her mouth. - "damianwayne? What does that mean?" - She looked again at the words together, her head tilting to the side as she tried to decipher the words. Then something started to make a little sense in her head. - “Wait, are the two words ... Damian Wayne? What does that mean?" - She blinked a few times before the reason finally fell on her head with the weight of an anchor, at the same time that her words prowled her mind, connecting everything completely.

Damian Wayne.

\- "Oh no." - Raven opened her mouth and pulled up the browser quickly, searching google for the meaning of the name “Damian” - “ _From the Greek name‘ Damianos ’, from damao (“Tame” /”Tamer)_.”

_“I cannot tell you my name. It's very specific. You would easily find out who I am. But I'll give you a clue: my name is derived from the Greek and it could mean Tame.”_

\- "It means Tame" - Raven repeated, looking in shock at herself in the reflection of the cell phone. - "His name is Damian." - The memory started to form in Raven's head like a storm that she didn't know how to control. His name was Damian, a very specific name because he was a Wayne. 

And to make matters worse, she had met him the night before. Not only him, but his beautiful, and seemingly very cool, girlfriend. They had even left the party together.

\- "Oh no." - Raven put her hand on her face, remembering him leaving holding the girl's hand as they walked out the door - "Oh, no!" - Raven felt her hands begin to shake and nervousness filled her heart.

Did he have a girlfriend? Why did he play with her that way if he had a girlfriend? Could she be jumping to conclusions?

There was only one person who could answer these questions, Maps.

Now it made perfect sense for Maps to be at that party that night, she had said that she would hand over the notebook to the boy at a party. Raven almost wanted to slap herself.

\- "Maps!" - Raven almost screamed when Maps' sleepy face appeared on the phone screen in the video call.

\- "Raven?" - She said in confusion - "Why are you calling me so early, and how do you know I'm not at the video store?"

\- "I called your boss and said that I am your cousin in the military, and I wanted to surprise you."

\- "And did it work?"

\- "It's an emergency." - Raven said, raising an eyebrow. - “It's about your friend. Damian.”

\- "Did he tell you his name?" - Raven made a face. - “Wait, he didn't tell me. But I just figured it out.”

\- "I need to know. Last night, was your friend at that party?”

\- “You know that’s against the rules. I can not answer."

\- "Please. You have to tell me.”

\- "You know I can’t!"

\- “Because, if it's him, he left the party with his ex... or current girlfriend. I Don’t know."

\- "HE DID WHAT?"

\- “Please tell me it wasn't him. I want to be wrong.” - Raven felt her eyes fill with water, and then the defeated face of Maps gave everything away. She could feel every bit of her heart breaking into a thousand tiny pieces.

Rose was right, there was a reason he hadn't left the notebook.

\- "You are not wrong." - Maps said with a defeated sigh. - "I'm sorry, Raven." - She hung up, and Raven just stood there in the middle of the street, feeling lost.

She had met the boy in the notebook, and he was not like the person that she imagined he was in her head. Physically, he was beautiful, just as she thought, but the boy in her head would never deceive her like that.

He would never make her think it was just a game.

A mixture of pain and anger bubbled up in Raven's chest, and as much as she tried to push it deep back down, all she wanted to do was scream that pain out. Her footsteps took her directly to the bar where her friends from the choir were. By the time she got there, the dangerous mixture of anger and pain had already taken over her being completely.

\- "The notebook boy hid a girlfriend from me!" - She said, when she saw them sitting at a table laughing at something funny.

\- "Ah, dear..." - Donna said, with a sullen face. - "Drink it." - She handed Raven the glass of beer she was drinking, and Raven took it without question, scrunching her nose as she drank the golden colored liquid.

\- "Hey, you're not old enough for that!" - Roy said, trying to hold her arm.

\- "Nope." - She said, giving the bottle back to Donna and going to Victor's glass. It was a glass with a slice of lemon, and something that was the color of lemonade, but it tasted even worse than Donna's glass. - "Ew, no." - She said, wiping her mouth and going to Kory's glass. Which actually tasted better than the other two. - "It tastes like a candy cane." - She said, looking at Kory.

\- "Mint schnapps." - She said, smiling. Raven looked at the glass again, turning the rest of the liquid into her mouth and banging the glass down on the table.

\- "We want another!" - They all shouted, laughing, giving Raven space to sit in the middle of them.

She doesn't know how much she drank that afternoon. But she did know that things were starting to get muddy for her, as if she could feel the earth spinning under her feet. It wasn't a pleasant feeling, but she was grateful that she was sitting.  
She was sure she would fall if she tried to get up.

\- "He didn't forget about me..." - She said, between sobs. - "He has another girl and she is perfect. He is also. Smart, funny, cute. Everything I wanted him to be. And we connect!” - She smiled, feeling sad. - “But then he left with her. I never kissed anyone, and I don't care that everyone knows. I thought it would be him.” - Donna looked at her for a few seconds and smiled, raising her mug for a toast. 

\- "To your first disappointment in love."

\- "A toast!"

\- "I still think she shouldn't be drinking." - Raven grinned and rolled her eyes, as she toasted and drank another glass. She didn't care, she needed to break the rules for once. She would leave for another state without having kissed the boy she dreamed of.

She was already in the fifth or sixth drink, when she decided to go and pay for a round for the group that had been listening to her lament about the misery of her teenage life. The bar had started to fill up shortly after lunch, and the music played loudly on the speakers. Raven smiled from ear to ear, even though she knew it was because of alcohol.

\- "Okay, I'll get one for you." - She said, staggering towards the counter. She leaned against the counter, and was waiting to be served by the waitress, when her eyes fell on the boy entering the bar. She tried to adjust her vision, but didn't know if she could trust what she saw.

She saw Damian entering the bar, but how did he manage to dye his hair green in such a short time?

\- "How did you get here?"

\- "I saw your post on Instagram, you weirdo." - He said, and the voice was not his. Raven blinked a few times, trying to make her eyes fit better, and the image that appeared finally seemed more real.

Gar.

\- "This is... Stalking."

\- "So, do you want a drink?" Raven raised an eyebrow, and Garfield smiled. Raven was too dizzy to be able to reason, but when looking at Kory, she just waved Raven to accept the company for a chat.

\- "So... Do you like Christmas traditions?"

\- "Mmm... Yeah..." - Raven murmured, with the straw in her mouth, trying to get out of his tentacles arms that were gradually getting closer. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a bunch of mistletoe, looking at it 

\- "Do you know what tradition says?"

\- "What is it?"

\- "Mistletoe..."

\- "That mistletoe didn't grow here."

\- "I stole it from outside." - He smiled, with a shrug, and then leaned over to kiss Raven, who managed to dodge in the last second, causing him to almost fall off the chair. Garfield took a deep breath and settled in his chair, looking like his ego is too hurt to try to understand why that girl wanted nothing to do with him.

\- "I don't want to kiss you, Garfield."

\- "Why? It's just a kiss under the mistletoe. And you never kissed anyone, what does it cost you to kiss me? It would be your first kiss and under the mistletoe.”

\- "This is holly, not mistletoe." - She rolled her eyes. - "And you shouldn't be trying to take advantage of a drunk girl, it can be considered harassing."

\- "Okay, whoever tried is no longer here." - He said, raising his hands. - "But can we at least be friends?" - He said, putting the mistletoe in his pocket again. Raven was sure he would try to use it with some other girl later.

_Pathetic._

\- "Okay... But if you try to kiss me again I will talk to the security guards."

\- “Can we hug at least? A Christmas hug.” - Raven huffed with a grimace on her face, looking at Garfield with his open arms and a smile on his face. He wouldn't give up if she didn't hug him at least once. Besides, Donna seemed to have listened, and now she looked at where Raven was, ready to throw that boy out of the bar if necessary.

Raven nodded slowly, and let Garfield give her a hug. Tight and long, she almost called for help when he finally decided to release her, and return to the chair. But before she was able to straighten up, someone entered the bar. The cold wind that came in when the door opened made Raven regain part of her senses, and look in the direction of whoever had entered, trying to force herself to see something other than Damian.

\- "Raven?" - He looked at her with a sad sort of confusion, and she didn't know what he had understood from that scenario. He looked hurt, broken. As if something had died inside him, and he couldn't believe it as he looked at her. In his hands, he held her boot and the red notebook.

He walked among the people slowly until he reached her, and his eyes, despite the intense green, had a reddish hue. As if he was trying hard not to cry.

\- "It’s you." - Raven said, laughing weakly. How dare he appear there? How did he find out she was there? - “How did you know where I was?”

_**December 25 - 9:40 am** _

Damian opened his eyes slowly, the sound of his phone vibrating somewhere between the covers. Everything seemed out of focus while he was still trying to catch up with what was actually happening, and what was still a dream.

It seemed too early to wake up, the room still seemed too dark to be time to get up.

Damian rolled over in bed again, trying to ignore the phone's buzz. Finally giving up completely when he had to open his eyes, and reach for the phone to turn off the alarm clock. He blinked a few times to get his eyes used to the brightness of the screen, when the memory hit his head like a baseball bat.

_The notebook._

Damian got up quickly, throwing the covers all over the room, as he tried to find his cell phone, and something to put on. The snow was falling again, and he had foolishly missed the hour.

\- "No! Shit!! I forgot to hand over the notebook!” - He groaned, as he changed clothes quickly, picking up the clothes he had left on the floor after returning home. He remembered that he had left Emiko at the hotel right after the deep conversation they had, and came home thinking about what he wanted to say to the girl when he finally found her. He would take her to see Collage for sure. She had talked about it in the last message. And he would want to know every detail about her, every thing she liked, and every thing she hated.

How could he sleep in so much that day?

Damian threw his coat over his shoulder almost as soon as the phone vibrated again, but this time the message that appeared on the screen caught his attention. It wasn't someone sending him something, it was a message from “mom's app.”

_"Was anyone looking for a blue rubber boot?"_

\- "What? When did I download this app? ” - He said, confused. As he left the room, the memory of Maps bloomed in his mind. She had downloaded this app when he was desperate, thinking that he scared her with the punk show.

Damian opened the message quickly, looking for the information they had posted. The boot owner had been spotted in the Iceberg Lounge just over 20 minutes ago, if he hurried on, maybe she was still there.

Maps was right, those women knew everything.

Damian went out to get the car keys from Bruce's garage. Now that his dad knew he was in town, it didn't make sense for him to be taxiing around town. Not when there was a line of 10 different cars in the penthouse garage, and a few more in the garage of the mansion. It helped him to get places faster, relying on Gotham's taxi service was almost a hell of an experience if you were in a hurry.

Damian put together a plan while driving through the city. He would buy tickets to the cinema, and then invite her to go with him to the film showing. Then, maybe they would walk around Gotham, or go to see some Christmas decorations. He wanted to spend the day with her, and at the end of the day, take her home and exchange phone numbers. And then, schedule another date, and maybe kiss her before saying goodbye.

It was too fanciful and cliché, but it was a plan.

It was 10 am on Christmas morning, but still, a small line was formed to buy the tickets. When it was his turn, Damian was euphoric, and couldn't stop smiling.

Emiko was right, that girl deserved more than a notebook as a Christmas present.

\- "Hi! Two tickets to Collage, the 6:00 pm show.” - He said, leaning over the counter.

\- "It's incredible." - The listless salesman said. - "I never cried so much, and I saw Diary of a Passion twenty times."

\- "Is Collage sad?" - Damian said, worriedly, thinking about the possibility of changing his mind. No, he didn't want anything sad between them that day.

\- "Tears of joy."

\- "Great!" - He said, smiling, handing the card to the attendant, while trying to control his heart, it beat hard, like a drum. - “I will take a girl. We only know each other by text. I didn't know how to find her until I saw a post on a search app. This app.” - Damian said, smiling at the attendant - “It's her! This is her boot.” - He showed the blue boot in the other hand.

\- "Who cares?" - The client behind Damian grunted. - "I want to buy my tickets."

\- "Sir, that information came right when I needed it!" - Damian said, excitedly. - “It's fate! It's the magic of Christmas!”

\- "Get the fuck out of the queue!" - Normally, Damian would be in a bad mood and start a big fight. But, no. He felt things differently from before. It was as if he were Scrooge himself, after receiving a visit from the 3 ghosts of Christmas.

\- "Merry Christmas, you beautiful and angry gothamite!" - He said, running out, and hugging a man who was dressed as Santa Claus in the street, and putting some money in his red bag. - "I believe!"

Damian went back to the car, almost jumping along the way. When he stopped in front of Cobblepot's bar, he took a deep breath trying to control his nervousness and anxiety. If he entered the bar like that, he would surely scare her.

He looked in the mirror, his hair was disheveled, and his face was wrinkled, looking exactly like someone who had just woken up. He tried to straighten it a little, but it seemed impossible, his hair insisted on staying messy.

He was pitiful.

Damian took another deep breath and then let it out slowly, he needed to go in and look for her before she was gone. This was a unique opportunity to finally meet the girl he had been falling for the past few days, and he couldn't miss her.

With a last sigh of confidence as he pushed his fears and insecurities aside, he grabbed her boot and notebook from the car seat. Then took confident steps towards the bar, forcing his legs to move even though they were shaking.

His eyes scanned the place quickly, trying to recognize someone or see the boot, until it slowly fell on the feet of a woman hanging on the counter. She was accompanied and hugging someone, hugging a guy very intimately. His face was hidden in her shoulders.

Damian was in shock, first because that was the party girl at Crush's house. The funny girl who was wearing a green sweater full of Christmas tree decorations. She was also the carole girl he had seen the day he picked up the notebook at Gotham Bookshop. He hadn't remembered her the night before, but for some reason now the memories came like an avalanche in his mind.

Second, because the guy she was hugging was none other than Garfield Logan. Damian wanted to punch himself for his stupidity, now the "Gar" made sense. It all made sense now. She had been close to him all that time and he didn't notice. She had gone to the party with Garfield while she was playing the game, and saying that she wanted to meet him.

Damian felt something bubbling up inside him, a mix of sadness, anger and jealousy. He didn't want to feel jealous for a girl he didn't know, but he did.

Thinking that he didn't know her left a bitter taste in his mouth, how much of her did he know? How much of herself had she revealed to him? He felt in those days that he had known her all his life, but now he saw that he had not known anything about her.

\- "Raven?" - He finally managed to say, praying that his voice wouldn't come out as hurt as he felt.

She opened her eyes, looking visibly intoxicated. She looked at him for a few seconds, looking confused, and then she got up from the bench pushing Gar away when Damian walked over to her.

\- "Is that you." - She spoke in a confused voice. - “How did you know where I was? I don't even know where I am.”

\- "You are the girl from the party."

\- "And you are Damian." - She smiled sadly. - “The tamer. The next Alexander the Great.” - Damian looked at Gar leaning on the counter just behind her, with a smug smile on his face.

\- "What's up, Damian?"

\- "You are with him." - It was not a question, Damian felt the words leaving his lips before he could command them to return, it was a challenge to her. He felt something break inside him, and the pain was starting to become unbearable. His breath started to get heavy, but he commanded those bad feelings to come back. He didn't cry. - “Of course you are. How long have you been together?”

\- "As if you hadn't left the party with your girlfriend..."

\- "Wait, do you know each other?" - Garfield said, looking stumped.

\- "I thought so." - Damian said, looking at Raven, feeling his eyes sting. She staggered a little, and Damian couldn't control his protective instinct. She didn't look very well, like she was going to be sick any minute. - "Are you alright?"

\- "I don't feel so good."

\- "You drank?"

\- "So much..." - She winced and sobbed, putting her hand over her mouth.

\- "It's okay, Damian... I'll take her home."

\- "I can't go home like this." - Raven said quickly, remembering that Lois was there. If she came home stumbling and vomiting, Lois would lock her in the room forever, and put a small door just to pass food and water. - "Where's my coat?" - She scowled, and started walking towards two women who were not far from her.

Damian couldn't let Garfield take her home. He didn't trust anyone who was involved with a girl in that state.

\- "I know where to take her." - Damian said, putting the notebook in his pocket again while looking for the car keys.

\- "Don’t worry. I can take her."

\- "No, I'll take her myself." - Damian's voice was low and dark, enough to make Gar nod and raise his hands up.

She waved to Gar and her friends, and walked in front of Damian to the car stopped at the lounge door.

They were silent for a long, torturous minute. Damian was still trying to put the pieces together in his head, and she had her forehead against the glass, and her eyes were closed. Maybe she would sleep, and they would avoid that conversation. The game was over and he was the one who had lost.

\- "Logan?" - He finally said. - “Among all the guys, why him? What did you see in him?”

\- "I didn’t see anything." - She mumbled. - "And he's relaxed, fun."

\- "You mean he's not as depressing as I am?"

\- "I don’t know anything about you. Unless... Ah, yeah, I know you lied.” - She opened her eyes, but continued looking out the window. - “Because you spent the night with that unbearably perfect, and stupidly incredible, and unfairly beautiful girlfriend. You left the party in this same outfit.” - Her eyes fell on him. - "I'm not an idiot."

\- "Emiko and I broke up a year ago, okay?" - He said, feeling anger bubbling up inside him. - "The only thing I did yesterday, was to tell her that we are not going back."

\- "And why didn't you tell me you were seeing her in the notebook?" - He was silent, swallowing all the things he wanted to say to her. - “I'm also not with Garfield, for your information. I wouldn't be stupid enough to do that. It was a hug. It meant nothing.”

\- "Are you romantically hugging guys at random bars?"

\- "It was nothing! He wanted to kiss me and I should have just left! It would be my first kiss, but I wanted it to be with you. I wanted to hug you. But you were not there.” - Her eyes were red and crystalline drops started to roll down her pale cheeks. - "You said you would leave the notebook under my tree and you didn't."

\- “Oh I'm sorry, I was just late! Do you trust me that little?”

\- “You judge a lot! You have no idea what I went through.”

\- “Well, I thought I did. I thought that was the purpose of the notebook.”

\- "Well, I think we both kept secrets." - She said, looking at him. - “I hate that stupid notebook. It was the idea of my friend and her boyfriend. They wrote the first clues at the Gotham Bookshop.” - She wiped her face with her fingertips, and leaned her head back against the window, closing her eyes. Damian still looked at her, as he tried to hold his own tears and pay attention to the traffic.

For some reason, hearing that hurt him more than if she had admitted she was with someone else. The notebook was theirs, something they did together, but now, it looked like a castle of lies built with playing cards. A wind knocked everything down.

\- "You’re nothing like Maps said." - She grunted, with her eyes closed, crystal drops still falling down her face.

\- "You know Maps?"

\- "She said you would be nicer."

Maps had lied to him too? Had she lied that she didn't know who Raven was? All this time, Maps, had the person he thought was his best friend lied to him about Raven?

Damian took a deep breath and swallowed, slowly nodding his head as things finally came together, like pieces to a puzzle in his mind. There was no other way for this game to end without one of them getting hurt. It was a game, and for the game to end, there has to be a winner and a loser.

It was time to put an end to that game.

When they stopped in front of Zatanna Zatara's door, it took Damian a few minutes to leave the last message for Raven in the notebook, before opening the door and helping her up the steps. After he rang the bell, Damian thought about just leaving everything there and going. But he didn't think it was safe to leave her in that state standing on the steps.

Zatanna opened the door shortly after, looked at Raven for a few long seconds, before making room for her to enter.

\- “There, there, my dear." - She helped her in, placing a hand on her shoulder and guiding her inside. - "Come in and lie on the couch." - Raven mumbled something to Zatanna as she walked, that neither the magic nor the boy could understand. Then she disappeared into the house, seeming to have finally located where she was. Zatanna looked at Damian and smiled. - “Thank you for bringing her. This is not like her, I swear.”

\- "No. It’s… It’s alright." - He said, handing the blue boot to Zatanna with the notebook inside. 

Zatanna looked at the boot extended to her, and took a deep breath. Seeming to understand what had happened while holding the shoe with both hands.

\- "It doesn't have to be goodbye." - She said, with a sad smile. - "I know that when she gets sober--"

\- “No, I'm going. This was... ”- He bit his lower lip looking at her boot. - “It couldn't be as easy as it was in the notebook.” - He waved as he turned to go. Staying there made it hurt more.

\- "Don't give up right now that the game is interesting."

\- "I didn't give up first." - He said, turning on his heels. - " And I think we got tired of playing games."

Damian went home feeling devastated. Hearing it all, when he finally met the girl who had made him feel different, destroyed any good feeling that dared to grow in his heart. And now, he was alone at Christmas, and heartbroken.

And with two movie tickets in his pocket.

He wanted to punch something or yell at someone, but he knew it wasn't going to help. It would vent the anger, but it wouldn't take the pain away. Raven was exactly the girl in his head, but he was not the boy in hers.

Again, Damian felt that he was losing someone. Again, he felt he deserved nothing.

He went to the penthouse with the same weird feeling in his chest that he had before picking up that notebook that changed his days. Feeling numb by that sensation. The penthouse looked too big now, too cold, too alone. He didn't understand why he was feeling this way, he should have prepared for the worst as he always did.

Giving up to stay in those four walls that choked him, Damian decided to leave again. First, he would take the Christmas present to Maps and clarify why his friend had lied to him. And then, he would watch the movie at the cinema alone, and return home hating Christmas even more.

He was not Scrooge, he was the Grinch.

Damian rang the bell trying not to reign in his anger, but he hated being lied to. The confidence he had with Maps was gone, and he didn't know how much it would take to repair all that damage. He had trusted her, and she had hidden from him that she met that girl.

Damian was not known for forgiving lies.

\- "Dami!" - Maps said, opening the door with a smile on her face, when she saw Damian there. Damian said nothing, just handed her the package. - "Is it the robot that you promised me?" - She said, smiling, but Damian couldn't express any emotion. Just disappointment and anger.

\- "Raven said that you two met." - Damian said, trying to control his tone, and commanding his eyes to stop burning. Maps noticed this, because the smile turned into a mixture of apologies and fear. They were silent for a few seconds, before Damian sighed and wiped his eye with the back of his hand quickly. - "Why didn't you tell me?"

\- “Look, I just wanted to help you.”

\- "Well, you didn't help!" - Anger began to tint Damian's tone of voice, bubbling under his skin, and wanting to leave. - "Because now everything has been ruined."

\- "What?"

\- "What else did you lie about?"

\- “Come on, Dami... Don't be like that, man. No one is on your side more than I am.” - Damian took a deep breath, squeezing the bridge of his nose. - “Look, let's go in, you can celebrate Christmas with us, and you'll be much better. There's a strange bug in the oven and alcoholic eggnog. It's gonna be awesome!"

\- "I don't want to be poisoned." - Damian grunted, turning his back, and walking back towards the door.

\- "Hey Damian, don't say that... You can't-"

\- "I've already been too poisoned with your lies Maps, and I've screwed myself up with it all. Save me from the food, I might end up choking."

\- "I was just looking out for you!" - Maps shouted to his back, looking really offended. But Damian didn't turn around. He just raised his middle finger, and kept walking until he left the building, feeling completely alone and lost now. Without the notebook, without the girl he dared to like, and without his friend.

Lost in Gotham, he felt it was better to disappear.

_**December 25 - 6:30 pm** _

Raven opened her eyes, but quickly closed them again. She felt her body ache from the position she had slept in, and her arm was tingling. But nothing compared to the headache she was feeling.

\- "You drank." - Lois said in a dark way, and Raven felt her shoulders shrink. It was not a question, it was a statement.

\- "Nope."

\- "I smelled the alcohol from the entrance."

\- "Have you tried mint Schnapps?" - Raven said, making a face. - “You should try it. Maybe it will help you relax.”

\- "Raven," - Zatanna scolded, - "Don't make things worse."

\- "Up! Let's go home."

\- "The show is over, young lady."

\- "I don't need your help, Zatanna."

\- "Don’t exaggerate things. She made a mistake.”

\- "Did you let her drink?"

\- "Of course not. She left!"

\- "And by any chance do you know where she went?" - Zatanna closed her lips in a thin line looking at Raven, and then shook her head no - "As I imagined." Lois turned to Raven, taking things from the bag as she pulled the girl to her feet. - "Let’s go” - Zatanna tried to intercede for Raven, but it didn't help much. Lois dragged her out, carrying her purse and shoes, leaving no room for Raven to explain.

Lois was completely silent as they returned home. She didn't need to hear anything, she knew from Lois's eyes that she was disappointed in her goddaughter. But there was something else that Raven couldn't identify, as if she was hiding something. Perhaps it was Raven's paranoia speaking louder, besides, she was still under the influence of alcohol in her system.

Raven went up the stairs after Lois, trying to control her stomach, as she spun and spun with each flight of steps. Gods in heaven and demons in hell, she would come home and black out completely until the next day when, her stomach wasn't threatening to spill out even what she hadn't eaten.

\- "Why are you not talking to me?" - She said, when they reached the last flight of stairs. Lois took a deep breath and turned to her, both hands on her hips.

\- "You lied when I asked if you had drunk, you lied that you were going to Zatanna's house."

\- "I didn't lie about it."

\- "I can't follow your lies."

\- "No..." - Raven groaned, leaning against the wall. - "It's not what you think."

\- "I don't know what to really think anymore, Raven." - She huffed and turned again. - "Come, let's go in." - She waved to Raven. - "I will look for fennel and mint to make tea for you."

Raven mumbled something, as he dragged herself up the wall step by step. Lois was waiting for her at the apartment door, with the door open for her to enter, but to Raven's surprise they were not alone. Standing there at the door were Conner, Rose, Jonathan, Clark, Tara, and Angela. All dressed in matching pajamas, exactly how it was every year.

\- "Surprise!" - Everyone shouted, smiling.

\- "Mom?"

\- "I came back dear!" - She said, smiling - "Merry Christmas!"

\- "Raven?" - Rose said, with concern. Raven felt her stomach churn, and before she could help it, she felt the vomit rising up her throat. And her only reaction was to vomit in the boot she was carrying in her hands, before she vomited on the floor.

Everyone stared at her in shock for a long time, before she decided to retire to her room. 

She wanted to run, but was pretty sure that if she did, she would trip and fall flat on her face. It was definitely predictable that this would happen, so she walked as normal as possible to her room.

Raven lay there trying to find sleep, or something that would make her sleep for the rest of the holiday in just over an hour. She didn't have the strength to move, and knew that if she rolled over in bed, she would feel the world spinning beneath her. There were lively voices outside, music playing, and the smell of food that was making her stomach roll again. She heard the room door creak open, and was ready to dismiss whoever was entering. But she gave up the moment her eyes found Angela sitting on the bed, willing not to leave. She was hugging the matching pajamas that Raven would wear. But Raven had no desire to dress, she wanted to stay in that room until the new year if she could.

\- "How are you feeling?" - Angela whispered, looking at her with those big, round blue eyes.

\- "Is Christmas over yet?" - Raven grunted, without opening her eyes.

\- "Are you trying to hurt us all?" - She put her hand on Raven's leg. - "Me and your godparents moved heaven and earth to be here and spend Christmas with you." - Raven opened her eyes and slowly shifted on the bed, finally sitting up.

\- "Did you do all this for me?"

\- "It was Rose's idea." - She smiled. - "She organized everything."

\- "Why didn't you tell me the truth about the trip?"

\- "I didn't want to ruin your Christmas."

\- "But that's exactly what happened."

\- "Well, get ready, because there is more." - Angela said, in a serious tone.

\- "What?"

\- “I found your aunt. We had a conversation, and she agreed that you could stay with her there for 6 months. I did an interview there and I was hired, but I need to organize things here before I move there. You go right after the New Year to get used to the place, the weather, and your Aunt.” - She sighed. - "We are going to move in-"

\- "In a week?"

\- "Next week, to be more precise." - Raven looked at Angela in shock, she would have no time to do anything but dread what would come in a week. She took the pillow behind her and screamed for a long minute, while her lungs still had oxygen. - “I know, daughter. It sucks.”

\- "It's all too much." - She said. almost crying. - “Thousands of kilometers away. Moving houses, college... ”

\- “I have been working as a contractor here for a year. This city is not good for you to grow, and I think this job opportunity is a must. I know it is far.”

\- "We both belong to Gotham."

\- "We live in a rented apartment."

\- “Next week is too early. Everything I love the most is here.”

\- "Look, my love ..." - She gathered herself. - "It will happen. With or without your support. But I hope that it’s with.”

\- "I hate it." - Raven murmured, shaking her head. Her favorite holiday had become her nightmare. Why had this happened to her? Was this, by any chance, a kind of reversed situation in The Ghosts of Scrooge?

\- "I hate it too, my dear." - She said, sincerely. - "Put on your pajamas and come to the party." - She handed her wrapped plaid pajamas to her. - "It will be the last fraternization of our big family for a while." She smiled, crookedly, giving Raven a kiss on the forehead, before getting up and walking to the door. - "And tomorrow, you will have to explain about the things your aunt Lois told me about a notebook, and what seems to me like a hangover."

And with a thin smile, she closed the door, leaving Raven with folded pajamas on the bed, and a bad Christmas hanging over her head. She was going to get up to change clothes, when her eyes fell on the other boot inside her purse. Inside it, she saw the red notebook with a marked page.

Raven felt her hands hesitate, afraid, and her heart beat hard. That notebook shouldn't be there, it shouldn't be marked on a page. She felt her eyes sting, she didn't want to cry, but when she saw his handwriting there she couldn't control it anymore.

_“Dear Raven,  
We forged this disappointment ourselves. I would never be the guy in your head, even though you were exactly the girl in mine. But a fantasy would never live up to reality. There is no such thing as a Christmas miracle, and it is not your fault. It's mine for believing. _

_Thanks for playing with me, it was fun for a while. Only, like any game, in the end someone has to lose. And this time, we both lost._

_So, I'm writing to tell you “game over”._

_I think it is better not to see each other anymore. I honestly don't want to. I don't want you to keep doing something that you hate. I don't want to give my heart to someone who doesn't want it. We better move on._

_Goodbye, Raven. Merry Christmas."_


	9. New Year

_**December 31th** _  
_**10 hours til midnight** _

Damian felt empty again. A week had passed since that disastrous Christmas, a week since the last time he had spoken to Raven, and now everything seemed to be a great void. They had just met the wrong way, and for days he wondered why he got carried away by a game that would end badly for one of them.

But now it was no use regretting. Raven never left the notebook for him again, she disappeared into the smoke of Gotham in the same way that she appeared, and now Maps didn’t talk to him too. The same day he had lost a girl he liked he also seemed to lose a best friend, and now he was alone.  
He could have just gone to both of them. He could have gone to Zatanna's and asked to speak to Raven. He could have gone to the movie store to apologize to Maps. But he was still very proud and he would rather die than give in. He hardly gave in to anything or apologized.

Damian didn't even know if Raven was with someone now, maybe she decided to go with Gar. Maybe he was in the game too. Maybe for her it really was just a game and he was too stupid and ended up falling for her. Damian felt that he would go crazy if he stayed another minute inside that apartment with those thoughts buzzing in his head.

Before he went completely mad, Damian left the apartment without looking back, not quite sure where to go. Everywhere now reminded him of Raven and the things he had done thanks to the notebook. It hurt to feel it, but here he was again after wandering the streets of Gotham, where it all started:

_Gotham's bookstore._

Everything looked the same. The low music playing on speakers, the few people whispering between the shelves, and the _Pride & Prejudice_ books organized by color. Everything was the same that night, except for the detail, now there was no notebook in a red cover there waiting for him.

\- "Looking for something, sir?" - A female voice sounded behind him, making him almost jump. Great, even the grumpy attendant had changed, now there was a girl with a little nametag that read ‘Karen Beecher’. - "I will be happy to help you find something."

\- "What I'm looking for is not here." - Damian replied, discouraged.

She looked at him for a brief moment, hugging some books close to her chest. And after a few seconds, she seemed to understand something, that boy didn't need a book, he was broken. She smiled weakly and waved as she walked back to the other shelves, leaving Damian alone again with his loud thoughts.

He stood there wondering if he would ever be able to read Pride & Prejudice again without remembering that Christmas when something got his attention in the middle of the shelves.

\- "Psst." - Damian made a face and looked in the direction of the sound. - "Hey, boy." - Damian walked slowly to the shelf, and between the space, a female hand held out something he didn't think he would see again. The red notebook right there in front of him, just the way he remembered it. He picked up the notebook and before he could question anything, the girl at the information desk named Tara whispered, - "You never saw me here."

Damian tried to stop her from leaving, but she disappeared between the other shelves and left him there, with a red notebook in his hands again. He didn't understand why he had received the notebook again after a week with no contact, and after saying goodbye. But now he couldn't control his racing heart to make it beat more slowly.

His fingers roamed the cover, sliding across the black writing before going to the page marked by the red rubber band. He said he didn't want to do this anymore. That he didn't want her to do something she hated, but now she had contacted him again. This must be important. His heart almost jumped out of his mouth when he opened the notebook and found her handwriting there, along with the familiar scent of lavender.

 _“Dear Damian, I can say that, now that I finally know your name. A week ago, that seemed so important. It's funny how things change. I thought we would meet and have a great romance, and I thought Gotham to be magic. But it's New Year's Eve and at midnight I'm going to fly to San Francisco. I’m moving...”_ \- Damian opened his mouth and closed it again. She was leaving? Damian grabbed his bag and coat and left the bookshop, heading back to the apartment as fast as he could. He needed to think about it all.

He needed to think about that notebook in his hands again.

He read, reread, and read again when he arrived at the apartment, his heart like a hammer against his chest as he read her words. She seemed so different from the girl he thought he once knew, she seemed sad and cold. Like a child who finds out that Santa Claus doesn't exist and that his parents are going to divorce.

Damian tried to command his eyes not to shed a tear. They had accepted that this was the end, there was no turning back. Now she was leaving for another state, away from Gotham and away from any memory of him.

_“I'm moving on. You said we would never work and you were right, now I know that. But at least for one last Christmas... It was good to believe.”_

Damian stared at the open notebook on the table in the living room, his head resting on his hands as he thought about what to do. His pride told him to just ignore it all, he had been hurt enough to try again. But as time passed, that voice grew more and more distant.

\- "Damn it." - Damian grunted, taking the phone out of his pocket and typing in Maps phone number quickly. His pride was a silent voice in the back of his mind now, he needed to fix everything, or he would spend the rest of his life wondering what would have happened if he had tried to change. And he was tired of feeling empty.

After all, what was the purpose of the notebook if it didn't make him try new things?

_**9 hours til midnight** _

Raven took a deep breath, packing her last box. After a week, she couldn't feel anything. Neither sadness, nor pain, nor anger. It was like she was on autopilot and all her feelings were numb.

The magic of Christmas didn’t exist, and she learned it in the worst possible way. Now, she just wanted this to end.

\- "Cleaning day, my angel." - Angela's voice came from the door, pulling Raven out of her trance. Angela held a black trash bag in her hands, full of all the things they no longer wanted. - "A chance to leave everything bad behind and enter the new year and the new house with good things, and good feelings." - Angela smiled and left the bedroom door, taking the garbage bag out and leaving Raven with her own feelings reflecting what she had said. Raven looked at the things that were still on the bed, until her eyes fell on the muppet she made of Damian.

She didn't know why she was still keeping it there, but now it seemed like the right time to get rid of it.

A week later, Raven realized that it was best to forget all that. He was right, there was no way it could work, and they didn't even know each other deeply. The thin layer of trust between them had broken, and there was no going back. He made it clear that he didn't want more, and he didn't look for her anymore. It was time to be realistic and set foot on the ground.

Fairy tales didn’t exist, and enchanted princes didn’t come to her door to look for owners of blue rubber boots.

She wrote her goodbye to him in the little red book. After that night, he would be a painful memory that she would try to erase from her mind. A memory she would start to leave behind with that doll. Without looking back, Raven tossed it in the trash.

\- "Do you want to go for a walk?" - Rose said. leaning against the door.

\- "I need to packing these things."

\- “You've been at it since you woke up. You didn't even come out for breakfast!” - Rose gave a wry smile. - "Come on, I want one last walk before you replace me to tanned and patrician girls from Beverly Hills."

\- "I will not replace you!" - Raven said, rolling his eyes. She snorted, defeated when she saw that Rose was not willing to give up. - "You won't let me finish packing these things, will you?"

\- "No... I don't accept 'no' as an answer."

\- "Okay." - Raven gave an exhausted sigh. - "Just let me get a coat."

\- "Great..."

Rose and Raven walked in silence for a short while. Raven didn't want to start talking about how unhappy she felt, and Rose didn't seem to want to ask what had really happened since Raven said the game was over. She knew it was too recent a wound to be touched.

\- "This is so unfair." - Rose finally said, breaking the silence that reigned between them. Raven looked at her trying to understand what she was talking about. - "You know, your mother sends you away and she stays here."

\- "It's only until I finish high school." - Raven said, with a weak smile. - "She knows I'm going to come back here and go to college in Gotham or Metropolis, she can't help it."

\- "Well, until then, I have a farewell gift for you." - She smiled, handing a box to Raven. She looked at the box in her hands before opening it, finding cupcakes with the words ‘I’ll miss you’ written in lilac icing.- “It’s from that bakery you like, the one that is near Gotham Bookshop. They may not have a branch in San Francisco.”

\- "Yeah, probably not."

\- "So... Do you want to talk about boys?" - Rose said, with a raised eyebrow.

\- "I don't know ..." - She took a deep breath. - "It was... It was so bad, Rose."

\- "What actually happened? You didn't say why you don't speak to each other anymore.”

\- "I... I don't remember." - Raven made a face. - “I was drunk and I hugged the wrong guy, who by the way was trying to kiss me, and then he showed up there and said it was over. I remember some things said in a car but... ”- Raven shook her head. - “It's over. But I'm fine, a new place to live is a new beginning, and that will come in handy. There was no way that it could work, anyway. ” - Rose gave her a suspicious look and nodded. - "What?"

\- "Do you know when you say you're fine but you're not?"

\- "Yes."

\- “You are not well, I know that because I know you well. But this time, I know it will be okay.” - She laughed. - "Did I tell you about my first date?"

\- "No."

\- "It's because I don't remember." - She smiled. - “But my second date and second kiss: Eddie Gopher Bloomberg, the academy's file room, he was smoking and consequently asked me to smoke with him. Our lives were shit, you know... So, between one cigarette and another, in the middle of files of notes and enrollment, we kissed.” - Rose had a fond look on her face. - “Screw the first date and the first kiss. Or the first guy who cares about you. It is not about that. It is the first one important to you that matters.” - She put her hands on Raven's shoulders. - "A fresh start doesn't require a new home on the other side of the country."

\- "I'm sorry for Jason." - Raven said, letting out the air. - "I can't believe he was going to move to New York without warning."

\- "Ah, he won't move." - Rose said, frowning. - "He was just going to settle some Wayne issues in the first half of January." - Raven looked at Rose for a few seconds before understanding what Rose was saying.

\- "Wait, you dumped him for two weeks apart in New York?"

\- "It's a long time to be away!" - Rose said, shrugging, as if she was right. Raven was gaping, trying to resist the urge to hit Rose with the box of cupcakes.

\- "ROSE!"

\- "I deal poorly with distance, okay?!"

\- "My God!" - Raven slapped her.

\- "Don’t hit me!"

\- "I should hit you more!" - Raven said, still shocked. - “Oh my god Rose, I can't believe you broke up with him because of this! I can't believe I stood by you! ” - Rose was laughing, trying to dodge Raven's slap.

\- “I don't like distances! What if he found another girl in New York? IT'S TWO WEEKS!”

\- "You are ridiculous!" - Raven shook her head, unbelieving. - "After this we are going home, I need to digest this before I push you off the bridge."

\- "Aww, you love me."

\- "Shut up."

\- "I love you too ... I'll miss you." - Rose laughed. - “But don't think you're going to get rid of me. One phone call and I take the first flight to California, before you know it, I'll be right under your nose.” - She smiled putting her arm around Raven's shoulder.

\- "I know."

_**8 hours til midnight** _

\- "Hey, is Maps home?" - Damian said, walking around the room, hanging on the phone. He had been trying to talk to Maps for an hour, but no one seemed to be helping him. He had fucked up and he knew it, but he was starting to think he would have to start threatening someone to get information on his best friend's whereabouts. - “Right. But is she actually not home or are you covering for her because she's avoiding me?... Okay, no offense but that's exactly what you would say if you were covering for her.” - He felt his blood boil, he was wasting time there and no one helped him. - "I'M NOT BEING FINICKY!" - Damian shouted into the phone. Running his hand through his hair, he took a deep breath, trying to stay calm. - "Okay, but can you at least tell me where she is…? Ah... Okay, thanks for nothing." - He hung up the phone, too nervous to try to think straight.

He only needed 5 minutes to apologize. He had said things he didn't mean to Maps, so he knew she had a right to be avoiding him. He would avoid it if he could.

But the moment Damian learned that Maps had known Raven from the start, he felt betrayed, stabbed in the back. He valued truth and trust above anything, and in that moment, he knew that Maps had broken it. Even if she had good intentions.

And now he was sorry for it, he should have talked to her after he calmed down and not let this continue in the middle of Christmas. He had been an asshole with the only best friend he had, and now he had no one.

 _“Come on, Maps. Let's talk.”_ \- He sent it, for the thousandth time. She had viewed all the messages but she had not answered any. And again, the blue preview symbol appeared seconds after he sent it, but no reply came after that.

Damian would have to move if he wanted to fix things.

\- “I only have 8 hours, Maps. Where are you?” - It was New Year's Eve, so she would have to be somewhere celebrating. Maybe she posted something somewhere on social media. Knowing his friend well, she would have posted on Instagram for sure. A quick check and he already knew exactly where she was. - “Oh, hell no.”

And he hated it.

There was a show going on at the Botanical Gardens and Maps was there. It was not a simple end-of-year show, but a show by the famous and well-known actress and singer Dinah Lance. Popular with hysterical teenagers and people who enjoyed listening to honeyed pop songs about romance and love. Definitely not Damian's favorite style of music. To make things even worse, Dinah was none other than the sister-in-law of his ex-girlfriend.

_This was a nightmare._

But he would have to face it if he wanted to apologize to his friend and fix all the mess he made.

Damian threw his coat on his back and almost flew out the door. He needed to run if he still wanted to reach the Botanical Garden before the show was over. And he still had to look for Maps in the middle of a crowd of people shouting at that show.

He hated crowds, but he had little time to make a decision.

It took him an hour to get to the botanical garden. It seemed like the whole city of Gotham and Metropolis decided that it would be a great idea to go to a show in an outdoor park, and now he only had 7 hours to decide what to do.

After struggling to get a place to park two blocks away where the show was, he now had to face the sea bodies dancing to the sound of Dinah Lance's engaging voice. Damian spotted Maps almost close to the stage, looking like she was having fun while filming the show with her cell phone.

\- "Excuse me. I need to pass.”- Damian said, trying to get closer to Maps. - “Maps! ” - She looked at Damian, then rolled her eyes and left his sight walking to another place. - "Hey, Maps!" - He had to speed up his walk to reach her. - "Really? Maps! Come on!" She turned quickly to him, a frown on her face.

\- “I’m not talking to you, Damian. You blew me off on Christmas. At Christmas?"

\- "I... I know I was an idiot. I’m sorry. But I need your help.”

\- “I am tired of helping you. I know you pride yourself on being lonely, but being lonely is different from being a complete asshole.”

\- "She is not talking to you!" - Crush appeared from nowhere, stopping by the side of Maps. - "Don't talk to him, Maps."

\- "Why are you at a concert with Crush?"

\- "I have friends besides you, Damian!"

\- "Oh, look who's here!" Constantine's voice came from the other side, his perfect British accent being more annoying than normal for Damian. Why was Maps with all these people at a show? - “Baby bat! I heard you were an asshole at Christmas. Not cool."

\- "We do not stan." - The drummer in Constantine's band also appeared, judging Damian.

\- "Did you decide to hang out with everyone I know without me?" - Damian said, looking at Maps.

\- "Look who has risen from his _hundred years of solitude_!" - Emiko's voice came from behind him, taking him by surprise. Even Emiko was there, and Maps didn't even send him a poop emoji? 

\- "Maps!"

\- “You pushed us away. After a week gone, and now you decide to show up? You’re texting, and you're thinking we're all cool, asking for advice and help? Like I'm just gonna forgive you.” - Damian nodded, letting out a deep sigh, taking the blame for being an asshole. He still had his ego hurt by Maps having gone out to have fun with everyone he knew while ignoring his messages.

\- "Okay. I know I'm an asshole, but look... I came to a Dinah Lance concert for you!” - She stopped looking at him, her eyebrows furrowed as she seemed to analyze what he had said. Then her expression softened, returning to the old Maps he knew, with a mischievous smile on the corner of her lips.

\- "You came to a Dinah Lance concert for me?"

\- "Yes!" - Her smile widened, and then she opened her arms, giving Damian a tight hug. He didn't know how but she was disproportionately shaped for her small body. - "Hm... Is there any other place with less noise where we can talk?"

\- "And miss the show?"

\- "Well, It's about Raven."

\- "I got this." - Emiko said smiling, waving to both of them. - “I know a place.”

Maps, Damian, Constantine and his bandmate, and Crush followed Emiko to the parking lot where there were only two security guards, and buses with people running this way and that. Emiko talked to one of the security guards and then signaled them to enter. Damian looked at the time, he was running out of time.

\- "Okay, what happened?"

\- "Whose trailer is this, Emiko?"

\- "A friend who is at the show, relax."

\- "Who cares, Damian... Say, what's going on?" - Damian looked at everyone there. All of them sitting around and looking expectantly at him, he snorted, shaking his head as he took the notebook out of his pocket.

\- "She left me that today." - He showed the red notebook. - “I thought I would never see it again, until someone delivered it to me today at Gotham's bookstore. She says that she is moving to San Francisco, and she's flying out at midnight.”

\- "The 12:00 am flight to SFO." - Constantine's bandmate said, and everyone looked at him in silence and questioning expressions. - “What? I like air traffic apps.”

\- "What do I do?" - Damian said, ignoring the unnecessary information while looking at Maps and Emiko, waiting for some sign of help.

\- "I think you've done enough." - Crush said, with a shrug. - "I'm sorry but if I were her, I wouldn't want anything more to do with you."

\- “No, she said she stopped believing. That’s not the Raven that I know. ”

\- "Maybe you don't really know her." - Emiko said, calmly. - "Maybe that's just the girl in your head."

\- “No, I know this is important to her. If she stopped believing, that’s on me... it's my fault and I need to fix it.”

\- "I don’t know dude. Z would kill me if she knew I am advising you but... If you just want to feel better about yourself... You better just let her go and move on. ”

\- "I cannot stop thinking about her!" - Damian said, abruptly and desperately. - "And if she leaves tonight, I'm never gonna get the chance to tell her that."

\- "So what are you doing here?" - Maps said, rolling her eyes as if it were the most obvious thing. - "Go! Go look for her!"

\- "Well, I actually did that at Christmas and it only made things worse."

\- "Oh Damian..." - Emiko said, with a wry smile. - "Such an avid reader, and still obsessed with fairy tales."

\- "What do you mean?"

\- “People think that fairy tales are for girls. But who do you think wrote them?” - She said, with a crooked smile on her lips. - “Men see every girl as a princess to be rescued. And they see themselves as the prince.”

\- "Operation: Cinderella!" - Maps said, smiling and nudging Damian.

\- “When you went to Raven before, you wanted to be her Prince Charming. If you really like and care about her-”

\- "You need to go to her as you." - A different female voice sounded in the trailer, making everyone turn towards the door. There, standing and leaning against the jamb, was Dinah Lance still in her concert outfit. Making all of Damian's friends (mostly Maps) gape. - “Your friends are right. If you want this girl to give you a second chance, you gotta get real. Also, why are you in my trailer?”

\- “This is her trailer?" - Crush said, with raised eyebrows.

\- "What? She is my brother's wife. ” - Emiko said, with a shrug. - "It was a great show, Dinah."

\- "Thank you, Emi..."

\- "That's it..." - Damian muttered. - "I need to look for her as myself."

\- "When I asked Ollie to marry me, I had to dig deep. I had to get vulnerable." - Dinah said, with a soft expression. - "I can't believe I'm giving this advice to my sister-in-law's ex boyfriend, but, it's great to know that Ollie won't tear his hair out anymore because his sister is flying around Gotham with a Wayne."

\- "Hey... That’s good." - Damian said, looking at Dinah.

\- "What? That Emiko no longer comes to Gotham to sleep at her boyfriend's house?”

\- “No, what you said about being vulnerable... That’s good. That’s really good." - He looked at the others. - "Emiko, Maps we need to go."

\- "But I haven't finished my story."

\- "No, but you were perfect, it was great." - Damian was already at the door, waving for the others to follow him. - “Thanks Dinah. Send hugs to Oliver Queen for me.”

He had a lot to plan for before midnight and little time.

_**5 hours til midnight** _

Raven sighed, looking at her plate of food without the slightest desire to eat. Clark and Lois thought it would be a good way to say goodbye to the traditional New Year's stuff and they had prepared everything Raven liked most. But as much as she had appreciated the gesture, she had eaten almost nothing but the cupcakes that Rose had given her that day. She didn't feel hungry or wanted to eat.

She felt nothing.

So she sat there, rummaging through the food without the slightest desire to really eat. Thinking about how things would really be the moment she set foot in sunny California, and how she knew it was going to be difficult to adapt and meet new people. It had been difficult all those years in Metropolis and then Gotham.

She only hoped she could return when she finished high school.

 _"Just a year, Raven,"_ She thought to herself, as she put the plate in the sink _"Just a year and you'll be able to go back to Gotham."_

They sat in the living room after dinner for the traditional annual round of humiliation, as Rose and Conner liked to call it. Lois and Angela gave gifts if those there promised to behave in the next year. And although Rose wasn’t really and totally from the family, she had a personal record of times that she committed to being better in the year that started and then breaking it.

Raven never had to go through this embarrassment for that part of the New Year, except when she got a B- in math.

\- "Lois is dividing the money into envelopes." - Conner whispered to Raven. - "You are screwed."

\- "No." - Raven murmured in the same tone. - “Aunt Lois is not mad at me. She probably even forgot what happened at Christmas.”

\- “Coming from someone with experience in disappointing my real family and my non-family...” - Rose said, from the other side, - “you think she's forgotten... Until New Year's, when she tells you everything you've done wrong in front of the entire family. In exchange for the gift of money. It's a super fun tradition. Look on the bright side, those look like 20s. It's better than last year when Conner and I got chocolate.”

\- "Conner."

\- "Happy New Year, Lois!" - He said, smiling at Lois as he reached for the envelope.

\- "I want to discuss your old year first." - She smirked, and Conner retracted his hand again. - “You started at Metropolis University last year in the fall and left two months later because, according to you, you were so heartbroken because of Cassandra that you had no head to study. But a year passed, and now you’re dating the Wayne’s boy, Tim Drake,”

\- “It seems that this whole generation will now end up hanging on a Wayne's dick.” - Rose said, with a laugh.

\- “ROSE!”

\- “So... Can I consider your heart to be healed? But you didn't say anything about going back to school. Can I expect that to change in the new year?”

\- "Yes. I think I'm ready to go back to school, Lois.”

\- "Great." - Lois smiled, handing the envelope to Conner. - "Rose Wilson." - Lois said, with an unfriendly smile, looking at the three. Rose looked at Raven and stood up. Then whispered _"Watch a pro"_ to Raven before walking over to Lois.

\- "Here I am."

\- “I remember at our meeting last year, you said you were going to go to college. But in the middle of the year you hadn't applied for any classes yet. You said that you had a mind so messed because of your father and your last relationship. And that you couldn't study, and you didn't want another relationship anytime soon.”

\- "Nailed it, Lois... I'm all fucked up." - She gave a thin smile. - "Is that my gift?"

\- “Last week I found a naked boy in your room when you promised to take care of Raven.”

\- “Another Wayne boy… yeah.”

\- “So I guess you're ready for relationships, and you're not that messed up anymore. Can I expect you to go to college this year?”

\- "Sure! I'm already less psychologically damaged, I think I'm ready to go back to school.”

\- "Great." - Lois smiled, and handed the envelope to Rose. Then her eyes fell on Raven and she felt herself shrink. - "Raven?" - Raven took a deep breath and stood up, passing Rose who just made a face at her.

She walked slowly over to Lois holding her breath, and when Lois looked at her, she knew she was screwed.

\- "Happy New Year, Aunt Lois."

\- "My little bird." - Lois said, with a smile in her voice. - “I could always count on your responsibility. Which makes this year especially worrying.” - Raven bit her lower lip. - “I thought finding you out all night was an isolated act. But we heard reports from multiple friends, people who are always on our side, your neighbor at Macy's, Tara at Gotham Bookstore, your meditation master at Robinson Park ... ”

\- “Master Azar? She doesn't even speak!”

\- "They told me and your mom what you've been up to." - Raven looked at Angela who just shrugged. - “Breaking curfew, lying, going to parties, drinking alcohol, running all over Gotham because of a boy. When I heard that your mother had found your aunt, I didn't want it to shake you and mess up your life. I planned to convince your mother to leave you here, and then when she went to San Francisco you could be emancipated and could live here alone or live with us in Metropolis until you enter college. But now I realize that Gotham is not a place for a...” - She looked up at the door opening, and Raven followed her gaze only to find Zatanna entering their home with Constantine. - “Teenager.”

Constantine had a mischievous smile on his face as he kept his hands in his beige coat pocket.

\- "Am I late for the celebration?"

\- "This is a family event, Zatanna."

\- "I'm also her godmother, Lois... I'm part of that family."

\- "Then you can also hear this." - Lois took a deep breath. - “You changed, Raven. And we don't recognize you anymore. And for that reason, we believe that a new home will do you good. Unless you tell us it wasn't your fault. That the boy made you do it. That he was responsible for all this confusion. Wasn’t he?” - Raven licked her lower lip, restless.

She could say yes, that it was his fault, and that she didn't want to do any of that because she actually wanted to. She would never see him again, but she could at least stay in Gotham and live alone maybe. But did she want to? Did she want to live with that on her back? The weight of having lied? To have denied that those last few days were incredible, because for the first time in all those damn years she was a teenager like any other teenager her age?

\- "No. He was not." - She said, firmly. - “I am 17. I'm doing what teenagers do. Or were you, Uncle Clark, Mom, and everyone here saints when they were 17? Have you never been to a party? You never came home late? What's your excuse?" - Lois raised an eyebrow. - “You are uncompromising with Aunt Zatanna and you are uncompromising with Uncle Clark about moving to Smallville because of your job. Do you want to end up alone?” - She turned on her heel and looked at Rose. Oh no, now she wasn't going to shut up - “And Rose, Jason's going to New York for two weeks, which is not far from here and only because of family matters. This is no reason to break up with someone. I... I can't believe I was taking relationship advice from you!”

\- "People in this family have very distorted ideas about relationships and bonds." - Zatanna said, with a mocking amusement written on her face.

\- “Mom, you should have consulted me about living with someone I don’t even know in another state, I had a right to know. I know that you care about my education, and I know that you are thinking about my well being. I know you don't want me to get pregnant from the first guy I meet because you don't want the same traumas you have experienced, for me. But I had the right to decide who I want to live with.” - She took a deep breath, trying to control her choked voice. - “And, about that boy, I'm sorry to disappoint you all, but he didn't make me do anything. All of those mistakes, I made myself.”

\- "Then I'm sorry Raven, but you can't stay in Gotham." - Raven huffed out a breath and nodded slowly, saddened by her fate, but relieved to have finally gotten that off of her chest. After all the fingers were pointed and wounds were opened, Raven looked at the clock and sighed, it was time to go.

\- "Time to go, birdie." - Angela's voice came from behind her, placing her hand on her shoulder. - "First we'll take Rose to her house and then..."

\- "I know..." - Raven gave a weak smile. - "I... I'm ready."

_**5 hours til midnight** _

\- “Okay, I already sent the notebook to her, and the location. Now I need Christmas decorations” - Damian said, walking with Emiko and Maps towards Gotham Bookshop. He was so nervous, he didn't remember being nervous like that before.

\- “I’m on it. Lucky for you, I happen to know an elf from Macy's who can help me with this.” - Maps said, smiling.

\- "Right." - Damian said, waving. - “And food. I need food."

\- "I know a place where they put cheese on the pie." - Emiko said with amusement.

\- "And I can get that Babaganoush and the Canoles for Christmas." - Maps said, with her hand on Damian's shoulder. He took a deep, nervous breath, trying to calm himself and trying to get his brain to stop thinking about the possibilities of everything going wrong.

\- "Do you think it will work?"

\- "You can do it, Dami." - Maps smiled, giving Damian a hug. - “Okay, I'll go after things now. See you soon."

\- "Okay, thanks." - Damian said, smiling, returning the hug. Maps called for a taxi shortly after, picking up the phone and dialing a number quickly, as she left Damian and Emiko behind.

Damian took another deep breath, running a hand through his hair as he let the air out slowly.

\- "Ready?"

\- "I think it is now in the hands of destiny."

\- "No, it is not in the hands of fate... It is in your hands." - She gave one last reassuring smile and waved to a taxi that stopped beside them. - "Good luck, Damian."

Damian watched the taxi taking Emiko as he tried to think about his whole plan. He needed to figure out what he would say to her if she agreed to meet him at the library. He didn't believe he could make her stay, but he was used to going to San Francisco. And if she wanted to try again, he could take the hellish heat and the sunny days of San Francisco for her.

Damian took a quick shower, he only had 5 hours to organize the library and he hoped that things would work out at least this once. A part of him wanted to remain optimistic, but Crush's voice echoed in his mind. And he knew that Raven could have been sincere about hating that notebook and never wanting to see him again.

He tried to silence that voice in his head.

Maps texted him shortly afterwards when she got out of the bath, saying that she was already going to the bookstore and Emiko was also on her way. Now he was counting on Constantine to leave the notebook to her and the whole plan could work.

He couldn't believe that everything depended on a drunk like Constantine.

It took them just under an hour to organize everything exactly as Damian had in mind. And after confirming with Constantine that the notebook had been delivered, he began to feel nervousness crawling under his skin.

Now it would be all or nothing, and it would depend on Raven if he could get a chance to fix things with her again. He didn't want to waste another day just thinking about her and how completely stupid and jealous he was.

He didn't want to spend the rest of his days thinking that he was responsible for her losing hope for Christmas when she made him believe.

_**4 hours til midnight** _

Across town, Raven said goodbye to her best friend. They took the taxi shortly after Raven said goodbye to everyone, who were all trying not to cry. She didn't want to leave, but she knew that now she had no choice.

Her mother had gotten a job and she already had a destiny decided without her having an opinion on it.

\- "I'll keep Gotham warm for you" - Rose said, with a crooked smile.

\- "But I like it when it's cold."

\- "I will miss you." - Rose said, hugging her tight. Raven returned the hug tightly before heading back to the car.

Rose smiled, trying to keep her pose uncompromising and without crying, watching Raven walk back to the car. But when she was getting ready to enter her house something weighed in her pocket. Rose was surprised by the red notebook at her fingertips, marked on a page at the end of it.

\- "Raven, wait!" Rose shouted, but when she saw Raven's eyes, she gave up. She couldn't give her friend false hopes. She was too hurt because of that notebook and she needed a fresh start.

\- "What?"

\- "Uh... Nothing." - Rose lied, stuffing the notebook back in her pocket again - "Just... Happy New Year."

When the car left the horizon, taking Raven away, Rose felt safe enough to take the notebook out of her pocket and toss it in the first drawer she saw. Luckily, her father was not at home so she could enjoy her loneliness, and her pain at losing someone else, in peace. Raven didn't need to spend 6 hours of flight thinking about a damn notebook after it took away the beautiful shine she had.

Raven needed to forget that boy.

Rose threw herself on the bed, brooding over her melancholy as she reflected on what Raven had said to her. She knew she had overreacted, but she didn't handle distances well, no matter how small.

She wasn’t dealing well with the distance she would have from Raven. In fact, she was considering gathering her own things and running to San Francisco on the same flight as her friend.

But could she have been so wrong?

Rose rolled over on the bed, her eyes falling on the photo on her cell phone screen.  
She and Jason had taken that picture two days before fighting, when they were making snowmen, and Jason had told her that he wanted things between them to be official. She had a bad time with relationships, and they always made her think she was just a good fuck, but Jason did it differently.

And she really liked him. And she wanted a second chance to do the things right.

Rose looked at the cell phone screen for about 5 long minutes, before deciding to read what was in the notebook. She couldn't do to Raven what her mother had done, she couldn't decide for Raven about her fate.

If there was only a goodbye in that message, Rose would die with that secret. But if there was something more, Raven had a right to know, and a right to have a second chance with that boy.

Raven is the one who should have the power of choice.

_**3 hours til midnight** _

\- "Do you want to tell me about this mysterious boy?" - Angela said, after the taxi took off towards the airport. She and Raven were best friends most of all, but she was surprised that her daughter had hidden things about her encounters with a boy.

A Wayne boy, apparently.

Raven just pressed her lips together in a thin line and shook, putting on the headset to drown out her feelings. She didn't need all those voices in her head saying that everything was going to go wrong. And she didn't want to relive all the pain just to tell Angela about the stupid idea she had, to think that someone would fall in love with her one day.

It had been Angela's fault initially, None of that game would have happened if she hadn't broken a Christmas tradition and traveled to find a new home for Raven.

Angela nodded and took a deep breath, realizing that Raven needed space. She knew that girl well, and knew that she didn't handle change well, no matter how small, but hoped she would understand.

She would hate to be the cause of the heart of the most important thing in her life being broken.

\- "Well... You can continue writing to each other."

\- "No."

In the bookstore, Damian paced from one shelf to the next, too nervous to be still. An hour had passed since Constantine's message, and Raven hadn't shown up yet.

He didn't want to think about the worst case, but he was running out of time to be optimistic.

Maps had texted 5 minutes earlier asking if she had shown up, but Damian didn't have the strength to respond. Writing that she hadn't arrived would make things real and he didn't want that. He was trying his best not to be pessimistic.

\- "I need to close the store." - Tara said, walking towards the information desk, with Damian on his heel.

\- "No, please." - He said, breathlessly. - "Give me just 20 more minutes."

\- "I have a date!" - She grimaced. - “I'm going to see the fireworks with Garfield. I'm not ashamed of that, by the way.”

\- “15 minutes and I organize the fiction section for you. For free." - Tara gave Damian a serious look. - "Better yet, I organize the children's section... And I get dinner for you and your date at the best restaurant in Gotham."

\- "Boy, she isn’t coming." - She said seriously, but her tone of voice said more than that. She looked sad too. Damian felt the weight of those words with a bitter taste in his mouth. He did not want to believe that he had missed the opportunity. He clung so tightly to his own hope that he didn't want to let go.

\- "Y-You don't know... Maybe she couldn't get a taxi... Gotham is hell to get a taxi."

\- "Jesus." - She sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. - “Okay... You can stay. But I need this store to be locked, okay? If my boss knows that I left this shit open for a stranger to wait for a girl all night, I will get thrown to the street.”

Damian smiled at her, trying to hold on to what he had said to her, and not let nervousness and fear take over him. When Tara left the store next to a guy with green hair that Damian knew well, he felt the weight of silence and loneliness fall on his shoulders.

He sat in one of the armchairs. Looking at all the decorations that he, Maps, and Emiko provided in less than an hour, and all the food they had obtained. Part of him was angry with himself for taking so long to finally take action. Part of him wanted to cry about possibly missing a chance with a nice girl. And part of him wanted to keep holding on in the hope that it was just a setback.

She had received the notebook, according to Constantine.

Damian growled in frustration, putting his hand on his face.

In the taxi, Raven and Angela faced an unusual traffic jam in Gotham for that time. Cars and more cars honked near a scaffold, and the smoke of the cold night in shock from the heat of the engines, made Raven more stressed.

It seemed that the city didn’t want to let her go in any way.

\- "As soon as we leave Gotham, this traffic jam will end." - The driver said to Angela, looking worried.

Raven's phone vibrated with Rose's name appearing on the screen. Two messages arrived quickly, a text message, and just below, a photo.

_"You should see that."_

Raven scrunched her face and opened the photo, not believing what she was seeing. Her heart missed the beat as much as she wanted to avoid it, but there was a message from the boy in the notebook. A message from Damian to her.

She was torn between deleting the message. and reading it. But she couldn't stop her chest from hurting when she thought he had answered her at the last minute. She didn't want it to be goodbye, things were fine with her putting an end to it with the notebook, but the fact that Rose thought she should read it then meant something.

 _“Dear Raven, I am not the guy in your head, and you are not the girl in mine. But that doesn't make us strangers. Honestly, I think I even know you better than people in real-life. I know you're smart, and brave, because you take risks to get what you want. Perhaps we both had unrealistic expectations, but what we share remains real. The girl I met on the page is the one I see when I look at you.”_ \- Raven had tears in her eyes, and her hands were shaking. - _"The girl I fell in love with."_ \- Raven looked ahead, things framing in her mind like a puzzle.

He had fallen in love with her, just as she had fallen in love with him. Through her games and just words, he knew her as no one else had known her before. Like a movie, all those days passed in her mind, as she tried not to flood the car with the tears streaming down her face.

_"If it's not too late, I'll be waiting where we started."_

\- "We can take the bridge and continue to the Metropolis airport." - Angela spoke thoughtfully to the taxi driver. Raven looked ahead, and in a moment of impulse, she quickly removed her seat belt, unable to control the smile on her face. She couldn't leave until she heard what he had to say to her. Angela only noticed that Raven was leaving when Raven had already opened the car door, and left screaming, leaving her behind. - "Raven!"

Raven didn't look back, tears of happiness were streaming down her face, as she ran between the cars stopped in the traffic jam. The memories of every moment she spent with that notebook filling her mind.

She didn't see where she stepped, or which streets she turned on. But when her breath seemed to be running out, she finally saw Gotham's Bookstore shining at her as a sign of the angels. It was lit inside, but empty.

Raven put her hands on the latch, and took a deep breath, trying to catch her breath before forcing it open. To Raven's dismay, it was locked, and the hanging sign said it wouldn't open until January 2nd.

\- "No..." - She mumbled, trying to force the door to open. - "No, please... please... please open!"

\- "It looks like a job for a Christmas elf." A voice came from behind her, with the sound of keys being swung. Raven staggered looking at the person standing behind her, with a smile on his lips, the Macy's elf showed her the keys. - "Jingle Bells, my dear." He closed the keys in Raven's palm, and just walked away, leaving her there alone with the keys in hand.

She looked trembling at the golden key, her heart beating so fast that it almost hurt, as she spun toward the glass door again. She took a few deep breaths, before putting the key in the door and turning, the click making her hands shake more than a twig in the wind.

Was he there?

Low, soft music played over the speakers from the second floor, but it was very still and quiet in the rest of the bookstore. Raven followed the sound of the music, climbing the stairs slowly, ready to escape if necessary. Her fingers slid down the cold metal railing as she tried to take firm steps into space.

\- "Damian?"

What she found was a completely decorated space for Christmas. The lights were off, but the whole room was lit by small flasher lights, and strands of glitter, just like the one she was holding the first time she bumped into him. Raven couldn't help but smile, fingers skimming the shelves to a small Christmas tree set up next to a table. The tree was decorated with things about all the challenges. There was a red notebook, and a blue boot as ornaments. A small guitar, and a building with the letter W drawn on it. There were ornaments hanging from the tree of the foods they ate, from a little doll meditating, and many little Santa Claus and Santa Claus hats written with "Raven" on them.

She bit her bottom lip to keep from giggling, before starting to walk through space again, looking for Damian.

The table next to the Christmas tree had all the things he ate in those days, mochis, Canoles, Sirian bread and Babaganoush, cheese pie, and macarons. And out from the middle of a shelf came Damian. He had green eyes in a reddish tone, as if he were crying before she arrived, and he looked nervous.

He looked vulnerable, almost fragile and anxious, he couldn't stop moving his fingers.

\- "You... You gave me Gotham..." - Raven murmured in a shaky voice, as she showed the table.

\- "Yeah..." - Damian said, timidly. - "I mean, it didn't fit the whole city, but... I thought, on your last night, you deserved a last taste of everything."

\- "How did you do it?" - Raven said, unable to stop smiling.

\- "I had a lot of help." - He sucked in a breath. - “For someone lonely, I have good friends. One of them knows the Macy’s elf.” - He took another shaky breath. - "Look, I..."

\- "Stop." - Raven interrupted quickly, gathering her courage - "Damian..." - She looked at him with those blue eyes, and then gave a weak smile. - "Oh, why is it so much easier to say something in a book? I want to say how I feel but... Huh."- She put her hands on her face without being able to control her giggle, - "I can't because I never felt that before. I mean, I love my family, I've loved fictional characters, and I love my best friend who is almost a sister to me. I loved my kindergarten pet goldfish, the aquaboy. But this... This is so different. It's harder and...” - She grunted, as if she were in pain of digging up her own feelings Especially with Damian's green eyes weighing on her like that.

He had something in his eyes that made her feel welcomed and scared at the same time. They were like a hot flame on a cold night, like a new constellation that only she could discover. He stood there, watching her say everything in a tone of admiration, no more than 4 steps away from her.

She couldn't say everything, but she didn't want to waste time because she needed to get back to the car. They could talk, right?

Raven inhaled exasperatedly and released her breath before taking decisive steps towards him, letting her lips touch his lips. It took him seconds to notice what was going on, but he responded in kind when he finally understood that she was kissing him. Their hearts beat in harmony, racing like birds in a cage trying to get out. Damian put his hand on her waist, catching every drop of sweetness from Raven's lips.

It was exactly everything he had imagined and more.

Damian moved a few inches away just to keep the image of Raven in his mind with her eyes closed, a shy smile, and her lips parted, before bending down and kissing her again.  
When they moved away, both had pink cheeks and couldn't stop smiling.

\- "Mmm..." - Damian said, looking at Raven's lips, controlling himself not to kiss her again, and again, and again. They needed to talk, and he had rehearsed everything he wanted to say to her, but now everything was a mess in his mind. - "What was that?"

\- "Mmm... Sometimes words aren’t enough." - Raven said, resting her hands on his neck, then she smiled, but her eyes still looked sad. - "I have to go." - She said, unhappily. - "San Francisco."

\- "No..." - Damian whispered, putting his hands on Raven's face. - "Please stay a little longer, I need to say everything I have to say to you because... Because I need to say that.. If you want to try, I can go to San Francisco too and... ”

\- "Damian..." - She gave a sad smile. - "No, I don't want you to change your life for me." 

\- "I'm not going to change anything, Raven. I will add, not change.” - He smiled. - “I already go to San Francisco whenever possible to escape the mess of my family. I know the whole stupid Garfield Logan gang because I studied with them there. I just need to know if you are going to be there for me, because I want to try this. The only certainty I have, is that what I want most is to be with you." - Damian slid his fingertips down her face. - "I just need to know that you'll be there for me when I'm there and-"

Damian was interrupted by a quick kiss before he finished saying anything else, and for some reason that was the answer he needed to have. She would be there for him when he set foot in San Francisco. And he would be in Gotham the moment she said she would be back.

Before Raven finished kissing him, they were interrupted by Raven's phone ringing and vibrating madly.

\- "What is wrong?" - He murmured, when she picked up the phone. On the screen was a photo of Lois Lane, the mother of a friend of Damians. He could almost laugh at fate. He and Raven had been so close to each other all that time, and they ended up meeting because of a little red-covered notebook, and games they had played around town. - "Do you know the Kents?"

\- "They are my godparents..." - Raven said, with a wry smile as she answered the call. Raven asked for a minute, and walked away from Damian, expecting a furious Lois Lane on the other side. But what she found was a completely calm Lois Lane.

Firm but calm.

When she hung up the phone, Damian was looking at her with a raised eyebrow and a curious look, waiting for her to explain what had happened. She had a wry smile and raised eyebrows as if she were trying to put the pieces together in her mind.

\- "Is everything alright?"

\- "Mmm... Lois Lane just spoke to my mom." - She said, looking at Damian. - "If I want, I can stay in Gotham." - Raven gave a satisfied smile. - "And if she doesn't get a transfer to the Gotham headquarters, I can stay with her in Metropolis, and then with Aunt Zatanna when she goes to Smallville." - She had furrowed brows. - "She was flexible."

Damian smiled, feeling happier than he thought he could be. Raven wouldn’t leave, she would stay in Gotham and they could be together. He could take her to the movies, and invite her to family lunches on Sunday.

He could have her as a girlfriend, and pamper her as she should be pampered.

\- "This... this is great." - He laughed.

\- "And... Rose sent me a message saying that ... was she going to fix things with your brother...?"

\- "Brother?" - He looked confused. - "What brother?"

\- "She and Jason were having an affair... They helped me with the first clue."

\- "So..." - Damian relaxed his face, putting his arms around her, - "Were you close to me all this time?"

\- "I... I think so." - Raven laughed, hanging around his neck again. Now that she had him, she didn't want to let go of him, ever. She wanted to know every part of his world that she hadn't yet known. Every fear, every joy, every funny story. But when she bent to kiss him again, her phone rang again, and she remembered that she had left Angela in the taxi in a traffic jam next to Gotham Bridge.

\- "It’s my mother."

\- "Won't you answer?" - Damian murmured, with a messy smile forming on his face.

\- "I kind of abandoned her in the taxi in a traffic jam near the bridge, possibly causing her to miss our flight to San Francisco." - She released Damian, walking towards the door. - "I have to find her and, you know, apologize in person."

\- "Wait..." - Damian took her hand, intertwining their fingers. - "I'll go with you." - He gave her hand a little squeeze - "I think it's a good idea for me to apologize too."

\- "Okay..." - She took a deep breath. - "But we need to run and-" - Raven forced against the door, but it was locked. She forced it again, but nothing made the door open. Damian tried to force it too, but their eyes fell on the plate stuck to the glass. The door was stuck and should not have been closed.

\- "Oh..."

\- "I'm fucked."

\- "Mmm... Alright, it's nothing." - He said, trying to calm Raven. - "Your friend Tara can come and open it."

\- "She's on a date."

\- "Oh..." - He scratched his head, trying to think of a solution. - "Well, you can call your mother or your godparents." - He paused. - "If you tell Lois Lane you’re stuck in Gotham Bookshop with me, she'll send the fire department, the police, the CIA, the FBI, and the SWAT, and the army..." - Raven was looking at a fixed point on the floor, but there was a smile growing on her lips that Damian didn't understand what it meant.

\- "Wait." - Raven closed her eyes, and then looked at Damian, - "They don't know I'm here." - She took Damian's hands and pulled him to the window, where the countdown to midnight started to fill the city. - "We can be stuck here a little longer."

Across Gotham, people felt the good vibes of a new year beginning. Leaving things to the past, one felt that the year that was just beginning could be different.

Maps looked up at the lights lighting her face, as she wished things were better for her and her friends. She let her breathe out slowly when she delivered her wishes to the universe.

Emiko and Wally shared a kiss on the first day of the year. She was happy to finally be able to start again, and this time, for real. It was nice to know that she and Damian were the friends they were supposed to be.

In Neville, Rose was throwing snowballs at Jason's window. She screamed and called out to him, waiting for him to appear. When he finally appeared at the window, being greeted by a snowball in the face, Rose showed him the notebook she had brought to him.

\- "Jason, I'm sorry!" - She shouted, showing him the blue notebook in her hand - “I brought you a notebook! You send it from New York! ” - She cried, smiling, and Jason smiled back, running to open the door to kiss her quickly.

And in the bookstore, Raven and Damian were watching the fires out the window, their fingers intertwined as they smiled at each other.

\- "Happy new year, Damian."

\- "Happy New Year, Raven." - He put his hand on her face, giving her a kiss the moment one of the fireworks went up to the sky, illuminating the two in gold. They knew that the year would be different this time, and that who they were before had been left behind. They would have difficulties, and obstacles in the new stage that they would start, but they would have each other, and that was the important thing.

They would have each other and a magical book of dares with a red cover,

 _ **The End**_.


End file.
